


Strange Girls

by Ksiezniczka



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-06
Updated: 2014-01-30
Packaged: 2018-01-03 14:56:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 22
Words: 62,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1071787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ksiezniczka/pseuds/Ksiezniczka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Moira Callahan is just a normal college girl living in San Francisco - until she discovers an ancient amulet, accidentally resurrects a dead princess, finds herself hunted by a mysterious shadow being, and maybe, just maybe, finds herself falling in love... all while trying to get through college. What's a girl to do?!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Museum Blueseum

**Author's Note:**

> This was this year's piece for NaNoWriMo, so it isn't proofread yet and probably isn't paced very well either. Still, people expressed interest in reading it anyway...

Chapter One: Museum Blueseum

_"If you're going to San Francisco, be sure to wear some flowers in your hair." ~ Scott McKenzie_

 

"Moira, can you take my tour shift?" 

I really really did not want to take Jen's tour shift.  True, I had no classes on this particular day - no classes on Friday, not for Moira Callahan.  But I still hadn't packed my stuff for the next weekend, when I went down south to visit my family in San Jose.  True, San Francisco to San Jose was not that long a trip - I could just drive back up if I forgot anything.  Still though.  I'd been working gift shop for four hours.  The last thing I wanted to do was give a tour.

Still, though, I couldn't very well say no, not when Jen was giving me that look.  I knew her dad was in the hospital right now (appendicitis, nothing too severe, but Jen was a worrier.) and of course, Mousy Moira, that's me.  I numbly nodded.  

"Yeah, just tell Dr. Brooks for me, okay?"  Dr. Brooks was, of course, our boss, the museum curator at San Francisco's famed Palace of Legion of Honour.  

"Oh, thank you!  Thank you thank you thank you!" Jen positively bounced out of the break room and I sighed, ran a hand through my brown bobbed hair.  I checked my phone for the time and then shoved it back in the pocket of the khakis they made us wear here.  Jen's first tour - now my first tour - was beginning.

I walked briskly out to the lobby to meet them.  My eyes scanned the group.  Old tourists, college freshmen, rich parents trying to make their spoiled brat kids more "cultured"… the usual.  But then…

Oh, no.

My heart sank in my chest as I saw my ex girlfriend.  Clinging to the arm of some boy - _a boy!_ \- as if she was on… a date?  Julia Evans had broken up with me four months ago and she was already on a date with a boy?  I don't know what stung the most - the fact that she was dating again so soon or the fact that it was a boy.  Was I really so bad that she went back to men?  Was I really so easy to get over?  It wasn't that I wanted her back, of course, but to see some misery in her face would be nice!  

I couldn't help myself.  My eyes scanned her outfit.  Dark blue jeans - _jeans to a museum, Julia?_   A dark green top stretched tight over her admittedly voluptuous chest - _Attention grabbing much?_   A gold pendant - _hey wait a minute, I gave you that!_   I bristled.  Her hair was bubblegum pink now, but it had been red when I'd dated her.  Not like ginger red, but fire engine red.  Stop sign red.  Apple peel red.  Blood red, one might call it.

Our eyes met.  To our credit, she looked apologetic when she realized it was me.  I don't think she'd meant to get on one of my tours, maybe just stop in the gift shop on her way out to see if I was still hurting from what she'd done to me.  She did know I worked here.  Why didn't she take that stupid boy to the De Young museum, or MoMa or something?!  I hated that boy.  I didn't know him, didn't care to know him and his stupid floppy emo hair.  But I hated him for making her smile like that.  How dare she be so happy without me?

I put on a big fake smile and addressed the group: 

"Welcome to the Palace of Legion of Honour!  My name is Moira, and I'll be your tour guide this afternoon!" 

Needless to say it wasn't my best tour.

After the tour, I passed the rest of the shift onto Herman, another coworker, and went to Dr. Brooks to tell him.

"Dr. Brooks?" I knocked on the door of his office, even though the door was open.  He sat behind his desk, the name plaque on the desk perfectly straight, reading "Dr. Clifford Brooks, Ph.D."  Balding on top with glasses and a brown and yellow suit, he kind of reminded me of an egg man - _I am the Walrus, koo koo ca choo_ \- or of Humpty Dumpty.  He was a funny sort of man but I couldn't help but kind of like him.  "I passed the rest of Jen's shift onto Herman.  Just letting you know."

He looked up, straightening his paperwork.  "Moira, you really shouldn't take someone's shift if you can't finish it."

I frowned. "I normally would and you know that, I just… something came up."

Dr. Brooks pushed his glasses up his red nose.  "Ex boyfriend?"

My face went red and I looked down at my shoes, shuffling my weight from foot to foot.  "Girlfriend, actually." 

He nodded his understanding.  "I see, I see."  I was grateful then that Dr. Brooks was San Francisco native and did not question my ex being a woman.

I should have left then, I really should have, but something caught my eye on the papers he was holding.  "Is that the Romanov coat of arms?"  I was a history major at San Francisco State University, and I confess that Russian history from about Peter the Great onwards was one of the things I had a soft spot for.  

Dr. Brooks arched an eyebrow.  "You recognized it from all the way over there?" 

"Are we getting a Romanov exhibit?!" I didn't answer the question.  I was still put off over the whole Julia thing, and looking for any reason to get excited over something.  But Dr. Brooks was not having it.  He merely smiled, shook his head, and said,

"Good bye Moira.  I'll see you on Monday after your class."

***

"Hey Moira Mouse," My roommate Kearny said when I got back to our dorm.  Ever since she'd heard me once describe my hair colour as "mouse brown" Kearny just thought it was so amusing to call me some variation of mouse.  Compared to the gorgeous Kearny Gutierrez? I may as well have been a mouse!  Kearny was Afro-Latina: half African (Ethiopian), half Latina (Colombian), and all the best physical traits from both nationalities.  She walked over to me as I sat on my bed and sat next to me, leaning her head on my shoulder so her curly dark brown ponytail fell down my back.  So this is what it was like to have long hair.

"Hey K. G. B." Her initials being K. G., sometimes I called her that in response, a fun (or so I thought) reference to Russian history.  The "B" stood for Bitch, of course.

I looked around our dorm room.  In addition to the beds and desks provided by the university, I could see a smattering of textbooks on the desks, as well as some general history books from my own collection.  Kearny's make up supplies were strewn on her bed.  I looked at the old Phrenology head on my desk that I'd found in a dumpster in the Mission district, at the little statue of Anubis I'd picked up when we'd gotten to host a traveling Egyptian exhibit in the Legion of Honour, at the bird skulls I'd bought in the Haight.  I saw some of the posters we had on the wall - the movie poster for "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas", a print of a Frida Kahlo painting, another print of an old World War Two propaganda poster - and some of the photos we had hanging up of our families and friends from back home.  (Well, back home for me - Kearny was San Francisco born and raised.  She was even named for a San Francisco street, the street where her parents - who were disgustingly in love - had met each other.)  

"How was work?" Kearny's voice snapped me out of my train of thought.  I sighed heavily and she made a face.  "Yipes.  That bad?"

"I took one of Jen's tours and Julia ended up being on it…"

"Oh, shit.  Did she talk to you at all?"

I merely shook my head, before clarifying, "She was on a date."

"A date?!"

"With a boy."

"Oh.  Oh shit," Kearny repeated.  "Shit, I'm sorry Moira."

I frowned.  "Why are you sorry?  What's being sorry gonna do?"

She lightly punched my arm.  "Shut up and take my sympathy, Mouse."  Then her features softened.  "Come on.  I'll buy you dinner."

We ended up going to this hole in the wall Chinese slash Vietnamese fusion place for Thai iced tea and Pho.  

"Ugh," I slurped my noodles.  No need to be polite and traditionally feminine with Kearny, who had known me since freshman year, and was, despite her femme appearance, a woman's studies minor.  (Her major was English.  Mine was, of course, my beloved history.)  "I love the City and I love you, but I am going to be so glad to go home next weekend.  I need to get away from the Palace for awhile."  The Palace was, of course, what I called my work, the Palace of Legion of Honour, if only because "The Palace of Legion of Honour" was a particularly long (not to mention pretentious) name to be using in everyday speech.

"Hey, cheer up Moira," Kearny smiled softly.  "Pretty soon you'll be saying the same thing about San Jose.  I know your family drives you nuts, Miss Callahan."

"Yeah?  So do you sometimes, but I still request to room with you every semester."

"That's because no one else will put up with you and you know it," she offered a small chuckle.  "Here, let me distract you from thinking about the little mermaid."  (That had been Kearny's nickname for Julia when we'd been dating, on account of Julia's then red colored hair that I mentioned earlier.)  "Let's play which historical figure would you bang first if given a time machine?"

Despite my sour mood, I snorted into my Thai iced tea.  "Oh my god.  Kearny!"

"Come on, I know you wanna be the meat in the Catherine the Great and Potemkin sandwich!"

"Catherine was one of the best rulers Russia ever had, why do you only remember the sexual stuff?!"

"It's the only stuff worth remembering," she winked.

"Okay, who's yours then?" I countered.

"James Dean."

"Doesn't count."

"Okay, J. F. K. then!"

"Ooh, should I tell Raffi?" I teased.  Rafael Vecta, nicknamed Raffi, was Kearny's Filipino boyfriend.

"He'd probably join in!"

We continued to banter like this throughout dinner, and by the end of it, I was in much higher spirits.


	2. Do You Know the Way to San Jose?

_"Isn't it amazing the way the future succeeds in creating an appropriate past?" ~ John Leonard_

 

The rest of the week passed by rather uneventfully.  I went to classes, worked, did a bunch of homework so that I would not have to worry about it at all when in San Jose - the usual.  I packed a duffel bag (which actually belonged to Kearny's boyfriend Raffi) for the weekend, and also picked out a couple books to take home and switch out with some books from back home, which was something I liked to do every now and then.  Friday morning came and it was time to move my car from where it had been parked pretty much since January. (Though to be fair, now it was only the end of March.)  In San Francisco, nobody drove if it wasn't absolutely necessary - parking was always a bitch to find, and why drive when one has MUNI and BART?  

My car sat waiting for me in one of the university's parking lots.  It was a boxy sedan from the nineteen eighties, painted blue.  Not the prettiest of cars, but it was reliable and worked well despite its age.  I called her Betty Lou.

I started Betty Lou up and was soon on 101, one of the freeways that connects the north and south bay.  I listened to the radio for awhile before remembering that I hate nearly everything on the radio, and then switched over to the classical music station, KDFC.  At least this one I knew already how to tune out, because it was the same radio station the Palace of Legion of Honour played in the gift shop.

As I was going over the junction that linked 101 to 85, I briefly wondered if my mother and stepdad Steve had tried to get my older sister Wendy home this weekend too.  (My mother named both my sister - Wendy Jane - and me - Moira Angela - after "Peter Pan" of all things.  She tried to name my little brother Peter but my father put his foot down that he could not be named after a slang term for penis.  As it is, my brother ended up being named Lucas.)  I decided probably not.  Wendy wouldn't drive all the way up from Los Angeles for a weekend.

I ended up being correct, in that Wendy was not there and that in that my mother, Lori Callahan - Schwalbach, had invited her up and she had declined.  

"Come in, come in!" My mother exclaimed as soon as I opened the door to the house I'd grown up in - as if I wasn't going to do that anyway.  She'd lightened her hair again, now it was blonde instead of the rich dark brown it naturally was, a colour I would have killed for.  I sighed wistfully - were that I not allergic to hair dye… "Come, sit down!  I'll have Steve make us some breakfast!  You still like eggs benedict, right?"

"Uh, yeah Mom, sure, just no Canadian Bacon.  Vegetarian, remember?  Can I put my bag down fir-"

"Hey big nerd," Lucas came down the stairs right then and jumped over the banister near the bottom.  My mother rolled her brown eyes.

"Lucas, can't you go down the stairs like a regular human being?"

"Hey Lucas Puke-us," I replied, mimicking my mother's well practiced eye roll.

"You find a new girlfriend yet?  Or are you going to die alone with five cats?" 

I frowned.  Stupid high school boys.  "I haven't even put my bag down yet."

"Lucas," my mother frowned.  "Take your sister's bag up to her room for her and quit hankering her about her love life!"

"Ooh, 'hankering', where'd you learn that, your Scrabble dictionary?" Despite this, Lucas grabbed Raffi's duffel bag and stomped up the rest of the stairs like an elephant.

My mother hugged me.  "Oh, don't listen to him.  His love life is non existent."

"Hey, I'm not worried about my love life, Mom.  You know?  Some like it hot, some like it cold, some like it dead for two thousand years and immortalized in a marble statue whose gaudy paint has long since faded…"

My mother did not appreciate my history based humor as much as I did.

***

"Hey Moira.  I was thinking maybe today we could go see a movie," My mother told me the next morning.

I frowned.  There were no movies out based on historical eras I was interested in.  Therefore, there were no movies out that I wanted to see.  Besides, I'd already made plans with Skyler, who had been my best friend since I was ten, and who went to college locally at San Jose State University.

"I can't.  I'm going hiking with Skyler."

My mother gave a well practiced heavy sigh.  "Hiking?!  Don't you walk over enough hills up in the City?"  She sighed again.  I knew what she was doing.  "I guess, it's not like you don't see me enough as it is.  I see how it is."  She was trying to guilt me out of my commitment.  I wasn't going to play her little game.  I protested:

"We're going to the Almaden Quicksilver Mines!  Skyler says she found an old graveyard last time she hiked over there!"

"Ugh, Moira, an abandoned old graveyard?  Really?  No wonder you can't find a boyfriend."

"Girlfriend, mom."

"Whatever!"

My frown deepened, and I kneeled down to tie the laces on my hiking shoes.  I hadn't worn them in so long - there was really no need for them in San Francisco.  "Mom, it's not just an old graveyard - this is history, real history!  Local history!  These were real people who lived here - who died here!"

"Moira, why do you have to be so morbid all the time?"

The doorbell rang just then.  Saved by the bell, Skyler was here.

Skyler MacIntyre looked like a typical California surfer girl.  Tanned skin, sun kissed platinum blonde hair, and ocean blue eyes.  Too bad San Jose was nowhere near the coast, she'd never surfed a day in her life, and she was even more morbid than I was, hoping even to someday go into the funeral business.  She had a great sense of humor though, and there was a reason we'd been best friends for so long, even after deciding to attend different universities.

"You ready to go?" she asked me with a wide dimpled grin.  My mother sighed yet again but I ignored it and left, closing the door behind me before she could object.  I loved my mother but she wasn't the only person I'd traveled down south to see, after all.

As we drove, we made small talk.  Skyler mentioned wanting to dip dye the bottom of her hair blue, I told her she would never be able to keep up with the upkeep of dip dyed hair and she knew it.  Before we knew it, we were there, at Almaden Quicksilver County Park.  I got out of the car and looked at the names of the various hiking trails: Senador Mine, Guadalupe, Mine Hill, New Almaden, Hacienda, Norton, Randol.

"Do you remember which trail it was?" I asked her.

Skyler grinned.  "Nnnnope!  Come on!" And with that she grabbed my arm before I could protest and pulled me onto one of the trails before I could read the sign to see where we were going.

"Shouldn't we, you know, know where we are?" Was the only little protest I could manage.

"Moira, Moira, Moira!  Where's your sense of adventure?!"

I had to admit, though, the park was beautiful, even if we were getting hopelessly lost and a little breathless from being slightly out of shape.  I was so used to the hills and tall buildings of San Francisco, of being able to turn and see one of the bridges or the Transamerica pyramid or the spires of Grace Cathedral, not all these trees and springtime wildflowers that were just beginning to bloom.  Skyler asked about my work and I began talking about how I suspected an upcoming Romanov exhibit, but that Dr. Brooks hadn't told me for sure.  Then, of course, I couldn't help but begin to rant about the Romanov dynasty, about its start with Ivan the Terrible, its greatest rulers Peter the Great and Catherine the Great, and its grisly end with the Bolshevik execution of Nicholas II, his wife, and his five children.  I was just getting to describing how the bullets were ricocheting off the girls' bejeweled corsets that they'd made to smuggle their jewels out of the Ipatiev house, when Skyler interrupted me by tugging on my sleeve.

"I like hearing about a murder as much as the next girl, but look over there," she gestured.

"What, is it that graveyard?"

It was not, in fact, that graveyard, but an old abandoned house.  I'd known that there had once been miner's houses around here, back when the quicksilver mines were still in business.  But I'd assumed they'd have been torn down.  I realized, looking at the dilapidated old building, that this was a dumb assumption - why would the city of San Jose waste money on tearing down old mercury miner's houses?  

"Come on," I grinned.  My sense of curiosity was getting the better of me - imagine the historical value in a house that hadn't been opened since its abandonment!  "Let's look inside!"

"I dunno," Skyler shrugged, flipping her blonde ponytail over her shoulder.  "It might be dangerous.  Asbestos and all that."

"Where's your sense of adventure?" I smirked at her, spitting her earlier words back in her face.  She stood up a little straighter and resolutely walked right past me into that house.  I followed briskly.

The floor was a mess, and the roof had caved in the entryway so we had to go through a window into the kitchen, climbing over the sink, which was pink.  There was a little bit of graffiti on one of the walls, but other than that and some plants growing through cracks in the floor, it looked just as it must have in… I guessed about 1950?

"This is so cool…" I breathed.

Skyler turned her head around the doorway into the hall.  "Ugh, it smells like something died in here… I'm going to go try and see what!"

I rolled my eyes.  "Don't become one of those corpses yourself, Skyler!"

"Yeah, yeah," She waved her hand, dismissing my comment as she ventured into the hall.  I turned my attention back to the wallpaper I'd been inspecting, wishing I'd brought a camera along with me.  Some of the cupboards - also painted pink - were ajar, as were a couple drawers.  Gingerly, I opened one of the drawers, expecting to see some dust covered silverware or something.  Instead, under a yellowing brittle old piece of paper that held a child's scribbled drawing, a glint of gold caught my eye.

_'…exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanica potestas…'_

In my haste to see what it was, I tore the drawing that I brushed aside, but that didn't matter when I pulled up a pendant, dusting it off with my shirt.  It wasn't tarnished at all, meaning that it was real gold - or at least plated with it.  The pendant was circular, with spirals etched into the gold around small blue stones.  In its centre was a larger red stone, which gleamed, almost glowed.

_'…omnis incursio infernalis adversarii, omnis legio, et secta diabolica…'_

I brought it closer to my eyes to inspect it, nose itching from all the dust I was kicking up in my "investigation" of this historical artifact.  I wondered how old it was.  It certainly didn't look like any style that had been popular in the forties or fifties, when I guessed this house had been abandoned.  Some of the homes in the area were abandoned as late as the seventies, but this one screamed forties or fifties to me.  I absentmindedly chewed the inside of my cheek, running a finger over one of the spirals etched into the metal.

_'…ergo draco maledicte et sectio, ergo draco maledicte et legio sectia diobolica…'_

I turned it over to see if maybe it would offer some clues to its origin, perhaps something like "Made in China, 1935" or something.  There was, in fact, another etching dead centre in the back, but it wasn't that.  It wasn't even in English, but Greek, and it looked hand carved, not machine carved.  I could identify that it was Greek based on what I knew from working in a museum, but I had no idea what it said.  I ran my fingertip over the Greek letters.

_'…ut Ecclésiam tuam secúra tibi fácias servire libertáte, te rogámus, audi nos.  Exmortis!'_

"Moira!"

"Gah!" I jumped at least a foot, shoving the strange pendant in my pocket as I whirled around.  "Skyler!  Don't sneak up on me like that!"

"Sneak up on you?  I called your name like five times!"

"You did?" Confused as I was, I cocked my head, a bit more like a dog than a mouse.

"Uh, yeah," Skyler looked at me like I was nuts.  

I shook my head.  I wasn't sure what had come over me just now, but I hadn't heard Skyler.  Just… the wind, I suppose, though it sounded more like strange whispers… I shook my head again.  "Sorry… did you find what you were looking for?"

"Yeah, it was a dead raccoon… Come on, let's get out of here before the asbestos kills us all."

I rolled my eyes.  Typical Skyler.  We hiked for a couple more hours, and eventually did find that graveyard.  Only when we drove back did I realize that the pendant was still in my pocket.


	3. Mystery at the Museum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's a mystery. At the museum. Pretty straightforward.

_"You cannot create experience.  You must undergo it." ~ Albert Camus_

 

Before I knew it, I was back in San Francisco, back to my schedule of school, MUNI, work, and homework.  I hadn't told anyone about the pendant yet.  To be honest, I wasn't entirely sure who I could tell, or who I should tell.  What would I say, that I had stolen it from an abandoned miner's house?  Was that legal?  Was it anymore illegal than archaeologists taking grave goods out of ancient tombs?  How far back in history did something have to be before it stopped being theft and started being historical discovery?  I wasn't sure how I would even explain it to Kearny, for I couldn't lie to her (or to anyone really - I was a really bad liar), so I didn't leave it in the room ever.  I always had it with me.  

After a few days I eventually put it on a chain that had once gone to a gold necklace that I hadn't worn in months.  I started wearing the pendant around my neck, under my shirts.  It was inconvenient at first - after all, the thing was the size of my fist - but eventually I got used to its weight around my neck, to its cool metal on the skin of my chest.  

Other than that, life returned more or less to normal.  March passed into April without any significant events happening.  Since it would soon be finals, Kearny, Raffi, Summer Wong (another friend of Kearny's and mine), and I started looking for apartments.  We couldn't stay in the dorms all summer and we all were sick of dorm life anyway.  And in April, the Palace of Legion of Honour started setting up a new exhibit that I for one was extremely excited for: "Three Hundred Years of Romanov Rule."  I had been correct in my assumption that we would soon be hosting a Romanov exhibit.

"Are you all going to come?" I asked my friends one day at lunch.  We were eating cheap food in Chinatown - the employees in the restaurant spoke terrible English, and Summer had to order for us.

"I dunno, are you guys gonna display some of Catherine the Great's sex toys?" Kearny joked.  Raffi, her boyfriend, elbowed her for that.  I was grateful, for if he hadn't then I would have.

"Don't listen to her, Moira," Raffi warned.

"What's it like having such a dirty mind all of the time?" I didn't heed Raffi's warning.  Kearny just smirked and replied:

"Mmm, endlessly entertaining!"

"I think we should get back to the more pressing issue," Summer interrupted us with her adorably high pitched voice.

Summer Wong was a funny sort.  The daughter of two Chinese immigrants, she was just over five feet tall and spoke with a high, soft voice.  Most people expected her to be shy and quiet because of this, but she wasn't.  Not that she was loud and boisterous either.  Rather, she was no nonsense, though she did have a fun side too.  She was a pre-med major, and worked at a free clinic in the Tenderloin.  

"Yeah, yeah," Kearny waved her hand.  "Apartments.  What'd you think of that one?"

"I think we need at least three bedrooms, small as they might be," Raffi said.  "That one would have been perfect with one more bedroom."

"Yeah," we all sighed dejectedly.  It appeared that without a miracle, I would have to spend all summer in San Jose.

***

Still, despite my apartment hunting woes and pre finals stress, I was awfully excited about the Romanov exhibit.  It opened on 22 April, Earth Day.  I had gift shop shift, selling fake Faberge eggs, matryoshkas, and books on the Romanovs to tourists and San Francisco natives alike, being sure to keep an eye out for things I might want to take home myself.  Oh, yeah, and for shoplifters, an ever present danger in such a fancy museum.

After a couple hours on shift, at one point I leaned down to pick up a pen I'd dropped.  When I stood back up, a woman was in front of the counter, glaring at me.  My face burned hot.  She couldn't have possibly been waiting that long.

"I'm sorry, ma'am," I apologized, "to have kept you waiting at all.  How can I help you?"  

She didn't look like she had any purchases to ring up.  She didn't say anything either.  Rather, she stood there, arms crossed, glaring at me.  Her hair was blonde, possibly dyed, and cut in a blunt bob similar to my own but without bangs.  I noticed crow's feet around her made up icy blue eyes, and her lips were thin, looking even thinner with how tightly pursed they were just now.  She wore a navy blue power suit with a steel grey silk blouse and matching pumps with pointed toes.  Her fingernails looked like talons.  Though I'm not one to oft judge people based on appearances, she looked like a bitch, and certainly not like a Romanov fan.

"Uh…" I began.

"Where," she finally spoke, "can I find that?  Do you sell them here?"  She gestured to my chest, and I looked down, only to find that my pendant had fallen out of my shirt when I'd bent over and was now visible for the world to see.

Blushing, though for what reason I don't know, I tucked it back under my blouse.

"Uh, no.  I, uh…" Shit, what should I say?  "My, uh, mom got it for me in, um, Greece.  Yeah."  It was a terrible lie, and I couldn't look Business Bitch in the eye as I said it, but she seemed to accept it, glaring at me one last time before walking away, her heels clicking on the ground.  Click clack, click clack, click clack.

Another hour passed rather uneventfully before something happened which shocked us all:

The museum's alarm system went off.

The loud ringing hurt my ears as the security guards poured in to evacuate the shoppers.  I wondered what that was all about - I certainly hadn't sounded any alarm, and besides, the alarm for shoplifters was silent.  This was the fire alarm.  My heart sank - was the Palace on fire?  What if some priceless historical artifacts were lost to the blaze?  What if we burned Peter the Great's underpants into ashes or something?  The security guards ushered us all into the break room, where Dr. Brooks was waiting for us.  In my haste, I brushed against one of the banners with Nicholas II's face on it, stepping over some broken glass - broken glass?!  I looked out a window on the way there - most of the guests were out in the courtyard being questioned by cops - not security guards, but cops.  I was a little in awe - in all my years in San Francisco I almost never saw any cops, to the point where sometimes I wondered if the City had any police force at all - but also relieved that there were no fire trucks pulling up.  So it wasn't a fire.

It turned out that someone had attempted to steal one of the Faberge eggs from the museum, and the alarm had gone off when they'd shattered the glass.  So that was where the broken glass had come from!  Dr. Brooks himself had taken a quick inventory and noticed nothing missing, though he was going to check again in more detail later just in case.

The guards asked each of us separately if we'd seen anything suspicious.  I confessed I hadn't - other than Business Bitch, there was really nothing out of the ordinary about my gift shop shift, and I couldn't very well name her.  She'd been bitchy but I didn't think she was our thief.  Dr. Brooks himself allowed me to go.  The whole MUNI ride back to the University was filled with thoughts of the theft - and of the mysterious bitchy business woman.  I got back to my dorm room jus as Kearny was getting ready to leave for one of her classes.

"Woah," Kearny said as I walked in.  "You're back like way early!  What's up?"

"Some asshole tried to steal from one of the exhibits so the museum closed temporarily and Dr. Brooks let us go early," I explained.  Kearny's ever present grin dropped.

"Shit," she breathed.  Then, louder, "Shit!  Shit, I'm sorry Moira!  I know how much that Russian history crap means to you.  Are you okay, though?"

"Oh, no, I'm totally fine.  A bit shaken but we don't actually think the guy was successful in his thievery, we think the alarms scared him off."

"Okay, that's good… hey, what's this?" Kearny walked over to me and grabbed at my chest - the pendant had fallen out of my shirt again!  And unlike Business Bitch, I knew Kearny would see right through my lie.  I had no choice but to tell her.

"Uh, you remember that old abandoned house I told you that Skyler and I found, near the mines?  I found this there."

"Whaaat?  So it's like from the fifties or something?" Kearny asked me as she was simultaneously pulling her dark curls back into a high ponytail.  It was getting closer to finals time, which meant less time spent on our appearances and more time spent on studying.

"No, see, that's the weird thing," I flipped it around and gestured to the Greek letters. "Look at this.  I think it's way older than the house I found it in, though I'm no expert."

"Lemme see it!" Kearny grinned.  I reached around and unhooked the latch on the chain, pulling the pendant off and reluctantly handing it to her.

"Be careful with it."

"Whoa!" She pretended to start to drop it, then laughed when I jumped.

"That isn't funny, Kearny!" I pouted a little.  "Seriously, just… be careful with it."

"I gotta admit," she looked it over, "it does look more Ren Faire than Rockabilly."

"Mmm," I nodded.  "That's exactly what I'm saying though." I sat on my bed and looked at my shoe.  I hadn't been as careful around the glass as I'd thought, as I noticed small shards of it embedded in my shoe.  Sighing, I grabbed some tweezers and began removing them, putting them in an old coffee cup still sitting on the windowsill from a few days ago.  There wasn't a lot of it, thankfully.  And ew, was that someone's fingernail in there?  I wrinkled my nose and removed the fingernail as well, tossing it on the floor.  Gross.  It was probably from MUNI.  Who the hell clips their nails on public transit?  Only in the City.

"It kind of reminds me of a fantasy movie," Kearny confessed.  "Like if you say magic words over it then a giant dragon will come and destroy your enemies or something.  Maybe it'll destroy my creative writing professor and I won't have to do that stupid assignment that's due next week, eh?"

"Because you totally know magic words," I rolled my eyes.

"You don't know that I don't," she smirked, then began waving on of her hands over the pendant.  "Beluga sevruga, come winds of the Caspian sea!"

"Kearny, that's from the Little Mermaid, I don't think-"

"Larengix glaucitis et max laryngitis la voce to me!" She winked at me.  "Now you say something!"

"I'm not singing."

"I didn't ask you to."

"Uh…" I thought back and could almost hear the strange whispering wind in my head. _'…ut Ecclésiam tuam secúra tibi fácias servire libertáte, te rogámus, audi nos.  Exmortis!'_ "Uh… Exmortis."

"Ameneth," Kearny nodded her approval, then handed it back to me.  I frowned and put it back on the chain around my neck.  "Hey was that Latin?"

"Pseudo-Latin, I think.  Mortis from Mort, the dead.  Ex from, well, I dunno.  Like an ex girlfriend or boyfriend."

"Ex dead?" Kearny arched an eyebrow.  "We're trying to raise a dragon, not zombies."

I blushed.  I didn't know why I'd said it either.


	4. Low Tide

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a short one. Though not the shortest, which is chapter 7.

_"If you're alive, you can't be bored in San Francisco.  If you're not alive, San Francisco will bring you to life." ~ Unknown_

 

A lot of things had already happened that spring that I could never have predicted.  The Romanov exhibit coming to the Palace of Legion of Honour, finding an abandoned house and a strange amulet pendant thing in that house, and the attempted robbery of the museum, to name a few.  But nothing - and I mean nothing - could possibly have prepared me for the naked dead girl.

In the middle of studying, I stepped out to go get coffee from the student union.  (Coffee might as well be ambrosia around finals time, after all!)  Sometime before I got back to the dorm room, Kearny texted me that she wasn't coming back to the room that night, that Raffi had invited her out.

I got back to the dorm room, fully prepared to spend a night studying alone, only to find a naked dead girl on my floor.

Admittedly, I didn't have any way of knowing she was dead at first, but the fact remained that there was a naked girl lying on my floor.

"Oh god," I set my coffee down on the floor and knelt down to try and shake her awake.  It was then that I realized the body was cold and rigid, and that the naked girl on my floor was, in fact, a corpse.

My mind instantly began to race, as did my heart.  How had a naked dead girl gotten in here?  Should I tell someone?  What would I even say?  No, I couldn't tell anyone, they might think I'd murdered her, and I just knew that would ruin my chances of becoming a world famous historian one day.  But then what could I do with her?  Drag her out and bury her?  No, someone might see me.  But if her body was already stiff, it had already begun to go into rigor mortis.  Which meant it would soon begin to decay, stinking up the dorm room, and in that case someone would discover her body anyway!  Now, I pride myself on not being a worrywart - well, not much of one, not most of the time - but I was intensely worried about the naked dead girl on my floor.

Okay, maybe not so much worrying.  More like completely freaking out, hands balled into shaking fists and even slightly hyperventilating.  I felt like I was gonna puke.  Miraculously, though, I didn't.

What I did do was try too quickly to get up, fall back down in my shakiness, and spill my coffee all over the corpse that lay before me.  And then I yelled:

"Fuck!  Fuuuuuuuck!"

I took off my black and white striped sweater, since it already had coffee on it, and began to wipe it up off the floor.  (I would have been a lot more upset if the sweater hadn't cost me only two bucks at a thrift shop, and if not for the fact that I was freaked out over the fucking dead girl lying naked on my floor!)  Then, I bit my lip as I wondered:

Should I wipe coffee off of the naked dead girl too?

I sighed.  Twice.  Then once again.  Three sighs.  Then I tried to resign myself to the fact that it wasn't as if the day was going to get any less weird.  (Key word "tried" - my hands were still shaking a little.)  And with that I forced myself to use my sweater to begin wiping up the naked dead girl too.  I tried not to think about the fact that I was wiping off her boob, both because I hadn't touched a boob since Julia dumped me and because of the fact that she was a freaking corpse and I was not ready emotionally or mentally to deal with the implications of that fact.  

And then the strangest thing happened.

As I was wiping off her shoulder, it moved.  Well, I moved it.  But I could have sworn that when I'd shaken her, the corpse had been stiff, already in the height of rigor mortis.  Her joints should not have been able to move.  And yet her shoulder was.  Experimentally, gingerly, I poked her elbow, which was dry.  Still stiff.  It made no scientific sense - the joints that had been spilled on could move and the ones that hadn't couldn't?  How on earth was that possible?  I frowned, and my gaze fell upon the naked dead girl's face.

The realization hit me like a tone of bricks: she looked familiar.  Extremely familiar.  I'd seen that face before.  Those honey colored waves of hair, the humble slope of the slightly upturned nose, the jawline and cheekbones and lips and all of it.  I'd seen that face in old photographs, in black and white.

"No…" I breathed.  Who was I talking to?  I didn't know, didn't think, just kept talking.  "No, there's no fucking way.  It couldn't possibly be…"

I jumped up and grabbed a book off my desk, _The Fate of the Romanovs_.  Flipping to the section with the photos, I looked from one photo in particular to the naked dead girl and back again.

"No.  No way.  No fucking way.  It's not possible."

It wasn't possible and yet there she was, naked and dead on my floor rather than a skeleton in a tomb in Russia.  The naked dead girl was the eldest of the last royal family in Russia.  There was no mistaking it.  Olga Nicolaevna Romanov was on my dorm room floor.


	5. Here's to You, Mrs. Henderson

Chapter Five: Here's to You, Mrs. Henderson

" _Well, of course, people are only human… but it really does not seem much for them to be." ~ Ivy Compton-Burnett_

 

I quickly fell into a routine with Olga's corpse, as odd as that may sound.  Whenever I was in class, at work, or otherwise out and about, I stashed her under my bed, covered by the blankets that only went on my bed in the winter.  The hunt for an apartment continued, and I worried about what I would do with the corpse once it came time to move out of the dorms.  I had a lot of respect and awe for Olga's family, and I didn't want to fold up her body and stuff it in a suitcase.  But what could I do with it?  Nothing I could think of seemed worthy of her position, of the terrible terrible end she'd met.  Even keeping her under the bed seemed kind of weird if I thought about it too hard, but I didn't really have a lot of options in the dorm room.

To my surprise, I found that coffee kept her body from decaying any further than "freshly dead".  I experimented a little bit, and found that black coffee worked best, but cream and sugar were okay.  Flavoured syrup was not okay, and negated the effect, as did decaf coffee.  I took to buying two cups of coffee daily - a small one for me to drink and the largest available size in black to pour all over Olga's body, which soaked it up like a sponge.  I tried hard not to look at her body too much when I did this, though it was hard not to stare at her face sometimes.  This was a real historical figure, just laying there on my floor.  And I would be an idiot if I didn't admit she was beautiful.  But she was still a corpse, even if she did make a beautiful corpse, so I didn't reflect on this too much.

And amongst all this, I still went out as often with possible with Raffi, Kearny, and Summer to try and find an apartment that was within our price range but not in the Tenderloin.  And, oh, some of the apartments we looked at were just terrible.

One had every single wall painted a bloody red for no discernible reason.  It was unnerving and we all felt like we would go insane if forced to live there.

One was in a building a little past its prime, as was the landlord selling it.  We asked about utilities, and she seemed reasonable at first, until she made the offhand comment, "unless any of you are one of those people who need to shower every day!"

Many of the apartments in our price range, even with all four of us pooling funds together, looked like people had been murdered - one of them even had bullet holes in the walls!  The real estate agent took a few days to catch on that we were just kidding when we started discussing where we would hide the bodies.  (Well, Raffi and Kearny and Summer were kidding.  I really did have to remember to keep this in mind!)  One place we looked at had a mirrored room - all the walls and the ceiling were paneled in mirrors, and so were the shelves that stuck out from the mirrors!  We decided pretty quickly to pass on that apartment, even if the rest of it was significantly less psychotic than most of the places we'd looked at.  Another place not too far from North Beach, which would have been a really nice area to live, smelled strongly of beer and Raffi discovered a wasp's nest in the shower.  That one quickly went from "not bad" to "no fucking way."  For now, the search had to go on.

It was after looking at that last one that I met Mrs. Henderson.

Raffi, Kearny, Summer, and I exited the apartment complex feeling awfully dejected, and Raffi had to catch one of the MUNI streetcars to get to work.  

"We're going to head over to Lichee Garden for some Dim Sum," Summer gestured towards Chinatown, since we were near the part of the City where Chinatown and Little Italy (as the locals often call North Beach) join up.  "Wanna come?"

Oddly enough, though I normally love Dim Sum, I actually did not feel like it that day.  What I did feel like was a cannoli.  So I shook my head and gestured towards Little Italy instead.

"No, you two go ahead.  I think I'm going to stay in Little Italy for awhile, maybe head over to City Lights and look at the books."

"Suit yourself," Kearny shrugged, then took Summer's arm.  "C'mon Summer."

We parted ways, walking opposite directions.  I made my way over to Mario's Bohemian Cigar Store, which despite the name does not sell cigars and is, in fact, a typical Italian cafe.  (It probably did sell cigars at one point, and just never changed the name.  Only in San Francisco!)  Ordering a cappuccino and a cannoli, I took a seat and pulled a book out of my school bag, which I'd brought along with me.  Might as well study a little.  However, I found it hard to focus.  For one thing, a woman at the next table over was arguing with her table mate.  And that voice… it sounded so familiar… I'd heard that bitchy tone before.

I turned around just in time to see the blonde bobbed Business Bitch - today in a burgundy suit and camel coloured blouse and pumps - storming out of the cafe.  Her table mate looked flabbergasted.  And my heart sank a little to see that her table mate had not been a business partner, but a harmless looking little old lady, with a snow white bun and little glasses perched on her nose and frumpy old lady clothes.  There are few thing in life that are more sad than cute old people eating alone.

Our eyes met - hers were a shimmery blue with wrinkles all around them - and I blushed.  What if she'd thought I'd been staring at her?  But to my surprise, she smiled and gestured to the seat opposite her, the one Business Bitch had left.  Not wanting to be rude - well, any more rude than I had been by turning and looking at her - I picked up my stuff and took the seat.

The little old woman was the first to speak and break our uneasy silence:

"I'm sorry you had to hear that, sweetie.  My daughter and I have just never seen eye to eye, but don't let us ruin your day."

"That woman is your daughter?!" I blurted out without really thinking about it, then blushed.  "I mean…"

"You know Krista?" The old woman arched an eyebrow.  Ah, so the Business Bitch was named Krista.  I had to admit, it was an appropriate name for her.  It sounded like exactly the right name for an icy blonde bitch.

"Well, uh… no, I don't exactly know her.  I've met her.  Once.  Briefly."  Before she could ask, I launched into my explanation, "I work at the Palace of Legion of Honour, that museum in Lincoln Park, you know?  She's come in when I was behind the counter at the gift shop."

"How odd.  I wouldn't have pegged Krista for a museum kind of girl," the old woman shrugged.

"I gotta be honest with you, she was pretty rude to me when I met her.  That's why I turned and stared at you two.  I wasn't trying to be nosy, I just recognized that rude tone of voice…" 

The old woman threw her head back and laughed at that.  "I admire your honesty, sweetie, and your spirit."

"You think I'm spirited?"  I don't know why but that was oddly flattering.

"Mario!" The old woman called out to the Italian behind the counter.  "Two more lattes for us, on me!"

"That's Mario?" I looked at him.

"I don't know.  One of them is Mario though, so if I call them all Mario then I'll be right at least some of the time."

It was my turn to laugh.  "So!   I know your daughter's name but what's yours?"

"Oh, that's right, I hadn't said it yet!  Do forgive me, sweetie, this old mind isn't what it used to be…" She took my hand and shook it.  "Molly Henderson, at your service."

"Nice to meet you!"  And I meant it, I really did.  Something about Mrs. Henderson was so warm and inviting.  "My name is Moira!  Moira Callahan."

"What a lovely name!" She exclaimed as the man who may or may not have been Mario brought us out lattes.

"Eh, it gets the job done," I smiled and took a sip of my latte, absentmindedly touching the fabric of my shirt (which was mock toile print today) over the pendant, as if checking to see if it was still there.  (It was.)  This did not go unnoticed by Mrs. Henderson.  I noticed her looking at where I'd touched.  "Uh…?"

"I don't know if you realized, Moira, but if you're trying to hide that amulet - a wise choice - then that shirt is far too thin to get the job done."

"H-how did you-!?" Well, it was no sense hiding it now, I guess.  Embarrassed, I sheepishly produced the pendant to let her see it, though I wasn't quite sure why I did that, other than my inability to lie once caught.

"Well, because it used to belong to my family."

"It did?" I frowned.  "Did… you used to live in San Jose?"

Mrs. Henderson sighed.  "Sit tight, Moira, sweetie, because it's a long story… Before I married my husband - may he rest in peace - my maiden name was Braginsky.  My father was the son of Russian immigrants and a quicksilver miner in San Jose.  Unfortunately, shortly after World War Two ended, suspicions about my father's political views forced us to leave our home rather suddenly - I was about twelve or thirteen when we moved."

I nodded.  "McCarthyism.  The Red Scare.  Right?"

"You're a smart girl, Moira!  That's exactly correct - my father was no communist, in fact his parents had been loyal to the royal family.  But tensions ran too high back then and no one believed his protests.  It was easier to move than to be sued and lose everything.  Unfortunately, my father left that amulet behind when we did.  We thought it lost forever.  Where did you find it?"

"In your old house, I think, in a drawer in the kitchen.  The Quicksilver mines are all abandoned now, and my best friend Skyler and I were exploring an abandoned house which I guess was your family home and, I dunno, something compelled me to take it…"  I hadn't realized how stupid this all sounded until I said it out loud.  I blushed.  But Mrs. Henderson didn't seem to think it was stupid.  She nodded sagely.

"I wouldn't be surprised if the amulet itself compelled you to do so.  It doesn't like to be alone."

"Uh…" I didn't know how to reply to that.  But it did explain why Krista wanted it.  "Do you want it back, then?  Isn't it rightfully Krista's?"

"No," Mrs. Henderson shook her head.  "You keep it, Moira.  Krista… her heart is not in the right place for such a responsibility.  I tried to raise her right, but she… she's a Republican.  You know how it goes.  You, however, I can see you have a good heart and won't use it irresponsibly."

"Okay…" I tucked it back under my shirt.  "So… so if it was your father's, can you tell me what the Greek letters on the back mean?"

"Theta Epsilon Omicron - 'Theo'," Mrs. Henderson nodded.  "The rest of the name was worn away a long time ago.  The amulet was a gift from Emperor Justinian to Empress Theodora when he was trying to woo her into marrying him."  So I had been right - the gold setting was medieval.  In fact, it was Byzantine!  The amulet, as Mrs. Henderson called it, belonged more in a museum than around my neck.  "After the fourth crusade, western Europeans took it and it disappeared for many centuries, resurfacing in the private collection of Catherine the Great.  It remained in the Russian royal family for generations until the revolution, when my grandparents - who had worked as servants to the tsar - smuggled it out of the country."

I couldn't believe it.  I just couldn't believe it.  "So this thing is ancient!  Well, technically medieval, but still!  Way old!"

"No, you were right the first time.  The gold setting itself dates back to the sixth century, but the stones are even older.  Justinian was not the first Roman Emperor to own it, that would have been Augustus, who inherited the stones from Julius Caesar himself.  Caesar had gotten them as a gift from the infamous Cleopatra.  Look at that central stone, Moira.  It's not ruby or garnet, is it?"

I took it out and looked at it.  Of course - I had been so stupid not to notice what it was.  "Carnelian…"

"Sacred to Isis," Mrs. Henderson nodded.

"How do you know all this?"

"Well, you know, family history and all that.  In addition, I used to teach ancient history at Stanford, after my hippie days."

An ex professor of history and an ex hippie - Mrs. Henderson had just gotten even cooler in my book.  How on earth had someone as cool as her had a daughter like Krista?!

"If it's really so old… I have a lot of respect for history, Mrs. Henderson.  It's my major, after all, and the Romanovs are a particular interest of mine - I'll take really good care of it, I promise!  Your trust in me won't be ill founded!  I swear!"

"Yes.  You'll have to, Moira.  I wasn't lying or exaggerating when I told you that amulet was a big responsibility.  Strange, strange things are going to happen to you, sweetie.  Strange, strange things indeed."

I chose not to tell her about the naked dead girl currently under my bed.  Strange things indeed!

Mrs. Henderson wrote something down on the back of a napkin and handed it to me.  It was an address.

"Unfortunately, sweetie, I have to go to my Tai Chi class.  But I would like to talk to you again soon.  This is my address in Nob Hill."

I nodded numbly.  It had been a lot of information to take in.  But I had a feeling it wouldn't be enough.  I would be seeing Mrs. Henderson again.


	6. Dead Strange

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Moira tries something without thinking it through

_"If you can't get rid of the skeleton in your closet, you'd best teach it to dance." ~ George Bernard Shaw_

 

It was after a particularly not at all riveting lecture on the French Revolution for one of my classes that I wondered what would happen if I poured the coffee down Olga's throat instead of rubbing it into her cold dead skin.  Was she decaying on the inside too?  I hadn't smelled anything that would indicate she was.  Maybe the coffee was going through her skin down into her organs.  But the idea had entered my head to try doing it and I had to admit I was curious.

And there was one more thing that made me curious.

Olga had been dead for so long, there should have been far littler left of her.  In fact, I knew for a fact there was little left of her - I'd seen the National Geographic documentary. I'd seen footage of her bones, the holes in her skull where the bullet that had killed her had entered and exited.  And yet, she was in my room, naked, and very much not a skeleton.  And I was almost positive that, against all logic, it was the fault of the amulet.

So was it possible that I could bring her back to life?

Would it be meddling with fate? 

Was there even any such thing?

What would I even say to this historical figure who was part of a dynasty I'd long admired?

I pushed such questions to the back of my mind, though somewhat guiltily.  I knew they were valid questions and I should have been thinking more about it, but - and maybe this makes me a coward, I don't know - I didn't _want_ to think about them.  No, I would not think about them, I refused.  Swallowing my guilt, when I bought that coffee that evening, I vowed that it was going down Olga's throat, for better of for worse. 

Kearny had already left for a shift at her job (she worked in retail downtown, and hated it, and especially hated night shifts, but it was better than her last job as a waitress at the tourist trap Rainforest Cafe) a few hours before I walked in.  Good.  One less distraction.  Though I didn't know when she would be back.  Never mind that now, this was my chance and I had to take it.

I reached under my bed and pulled Olga out into the centre of the floor.  I pulled out the blanket that usually hid her, and covered her torso with it so that her breasts and crotch wouldn't be exposed if this worked.  (And also so I wouldn't be tempted to stare at them, which I always was very conscious not to do.)  Brushing some of her honey colored hair out of her face and behind her ear, I took the first really good look at her facial features since the first day she'd appeared on my floor.  

I had to admit she was really beautiful, more so than the old photos I'd seen of her showed.

Suddenly I blushed, and reminded myself she was still dead.  Where had that thought even come from?!  Shaking my head, I forced myself to focus on the task at hand.  With one hand, I reached out and, tentatively, turned her chin toward me.  Her skin was cold, which helped me focus on the fact that she was still quite dead.  I concentrated on that cold rather than on how soft her lips were as I reached my thumb up and forced it through her lips, hooking it on her bottom teeth and forcing her mouth open.  I hesitated for the briefest of seconds - this was quite possibly the weirdest thing I'd ever done, and being that I lived in San Francisco, that was really saying something - but then I picked up her coffee with my free hand and poured it down her throat.  _Bottoms up, Your Highness!_

At first, nothing happened.

But just when I began to accept that nothing would happen, her eyes shot open.  They were a grayish blue, wide and sparkling.  She sat up and I screamed.  And then she screamed, pulling the blanket up to cover herself from me.  She was alive.  Olga Nikolaevna Romanov lived again, in my dorm room in San Francisco, and we were screaming wordlessly at each other.  And when the screaming stopped?  I was slightly hyperventilating, and she stared at me for a few minutes before she began to speak.  

At first, it didn't occur to me that I couldn't understand a word of what she was saying.  I was just so in awe.  I was right now hearing something that no other history fan alive right now had ever heard: the voice of a Romanov princess.  (Well, Grand Duchess technically, but still!)  It took me an embarrassingly long time to get my brain working enough to let me know that what she was speaking to me was, in fact, probably Russian.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!"  I held my hands up to her, trying to show her I was no threat to her.  "Olga, calm down.  I know you must be confused, but please just calm down.  I know you can speak English and understand me!" That, I did know - she spoke English, German, French, and Russian.

"Who are you?  Where am I?" She asked me, and I nearly started hyperventilating again - I was speaking, holding an actual conversation, with Olga Romanov!  "Why am I naked?!"

"Uhhhh funny story, actually…" I frowned.  "Well, not so much funny, as… well…"

"I am supposed to be dead," her tone was a lot more matter of fact than I would have assumed anyone saying that would use, even with her slight Russian accent.

"So you remember that part then?  Okay, that makes my job of explaining easier… You were dead."

She frowned, but didn't say anything else, looking at me expectantly.  I launched into an explanation of all I knew about the amulet and the fact that somehow, some way, it had brought her back to life from just a finger nail that somehow managed to travel from Russia to San Francisco, and that I was so so sorry that none of her family's fingernails had been included in that.  All things considering, she seemed to take it rather well.  By which I mean she did not start screaming again, which is what I was afraid of.

"So… why am I naked?" She asked again, and I blushed.

"You… kind of… came back that way.  You can't get clothes out of a fingernail!"

"And you did not think to dress me?"

"It seemed too weird - like dressing a giant doll."

"More weird than leaving me naked?"

Fuck, this wasn't going well.  Maybe I should have thought this through better.  I sighed.  "Look, Olga, I… I know you must be really confused and freaked out right now, but just trust me, okay?  I don't want to hurt you any more than you've already been hurt."  I looked up at her, and we locked eyes.  "Just… you've got to trust me.  Please?"

She said nothing for a few minutes.  Then, to my shock, she gave a little nod.  "I suppose if you wanted to hurt me you would have done so already."  She sounded more like she was trying to convince herself of that but it was a start.  

"Okay," I nodded.  Then repeated, more resolutely, "Okay.  Yeah.  Okay."  I held out my hand to shake.  "Here.  We got off to a bad start.  Let me start over - my name is Moira Callahan.  Just call me Moira, alright?"

She stared at my hand for a few more minutes, as if not sure what to do with it.  Then one hand poked out from under the blanket and she took my hand - Olga Romanov took my hand! - but didn't shake it.  "My name is Olga Nikolaevna… But I suppose you already know this?"

I smiled, trying to ease her nervousness a bit.  Much to my surprise and delight, she smiled back.  It was shaky and unsure, but it was a smile - Olga was smiling at me!  My own smile couldn't help but grow at that.

Until Kearny walked in, holding two full plastic bags and loudly announcing "I brought Chinese food!"

Olga stared at Kearny.  Kearny stared at Olga.  And then Olga said the worst possible thing she could have said:

"Moira, who is that negro woman?"

Oh god.

Kearny bristled.  "What did she just call me?!" She set the food down on her desk.  "She did not just call me what I think she just called me, did she?!  She'd better not have!"

"Kearny, please - she missed the whole Civil Rights movement!"  And women's lib.  And the holocaust.  And Stonewall and gay rights and the cold war and… shit.  I really hadn't thought this through.

To her credit, Olga looked a little embarrassed.  "I didn't mean any insult or injury, Miss…"

"Kearny…" I sighed.  "Olga, hold on."  I jumped up and retrieved _The Fate of the Romanovs_ from its spot on my own desk, and flipped it open to the photo section, showing Kearny.  "Look, I know it's bizarre but I think I kind of… accidentally resurrected a dead princess?  She's from the 1910s though, she doesn't know any better!"

Kearny grabbed the book from me, looked at it and then back to Olga, then shrugged.  "Alright."

"Alright?" That hadn't been what I was expecting.  

"You think this is the first paranormal shit I've had to deal with?"

"Wait, what?"

"What?"

I shook my head and turned back to Olga as Kearny got the food out.  "Olga, there's something I didn't tell you yet… It's not 1918 anymore.  It's the 21st century.  We don't use words like that anymore."

"Yeah, you can't say stuff like negro or colored woman or mammy or oriental or chinaman," Kearny casually began listing racial slurs.

Olga looked positively dizzy, even as we put the food in front of her.  "It's… the 21st century?"

"Yeah!" Kearny nodded.  "Exactly!  You got it!"

"…how… how long have I been dead?"

Kearny and I exchanged looks.  And then, not fully knowing why, I reached out and squeezed her hand.  She gave me a grateful look as I answered, "Almost a century.  I'm sorry…"

"Thank you for being honest with me, Moira." She looked up at Kearny.  "And thank you for the food, though I'm not hungry right this instant.  I'm truly sorry for offending you."

Kearny sighed.  "Tomorrow for sure I am taking you to the library and schooling you on feminism."

"I'm tired," Olga answered, a bit quickly.  

"Uh…" I hadn't thought of this either.  "If you don't mind sharing, my bed is right there.  Here, let me get you something to sleep in."  I handed her an old, overly large tee shirt, which she took without argument.  The surreality of seeing a real historical figure in my nightshirt was not lost on me.

After she lay down to sleep, as Kearny and I ate, Kearny broke the heavy silence which had descended on us:

"So… what are you going to do then, Moira?"

I knew she was talking about Olga.  I gulped.  "I don't… really know.  I just want… I don't know.  I want her to have the happy life that she should have had the first time around…" I had said it without thinking.  But now that I thought about it, it was true.  That was all I wanted for her.

Kearny smiled.  "You're too compassionate, Moira Mouse!  Only you would resurrect a dead chick and then be concerned with giving her a happy ending!"

"She deserves it, Kearny!"

My roommate frowned.  "Moira, you're not… gonna get a crush on her, are you?"

I shook my head.  "Don't be ridiculous.  Of course I won't get a crush on her!"


	7. The Revalation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shortest chapter ahoy!

_"If love is the answer, could you please rephrase the question?" ~ Lily Tomlin_

 

Fuck.

It was no use.  I had a crush on her. 

Fuck.  Fuck fuck fuck.


	8. The No Good Very Bad Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Moira has a shitty day and Olga has a small breakdown

" _Life is a rainbow which also includes black." ~ Yevgeny Yevtushenko_

 

Just as we had with every other crazy thing that happened in our lives, though, Kearny and I soon fell into a sort of routine with Olga.  It wasn't even all that weird as long as we kept in mind that there were cultural differences while at the same time not dwelling too hard on the fact that she should not have been alive.  One of us stayed with her at all times, except during the times when we were both in class or both working.  In that case, we placed her in the campus library until one of us could retrieve her.  Kearny had written out pages and pages of "must read" books for Olga so that the poor girl could catch up to the twenty first century.  Books on World War Two, on the Civil Rights movement, on feminism - and, to her credit, Olga plowed through them, and also sometimes used Kearny's library card to check out books not on the list - though we started asking her to ask us first after I caught her fuming angrily at a biography of Anna Anderson.  

Though she still dressed as Edwardian as possible (between Kearny's fashion conscious ways and my habit of buying thrift shop clothes from the seventies and eighties, we had enough long sleeved blouses and maxi skirts to keep Olga clothed for… maybe a little over a week if she mixed and matched, which she did.), Olga began to adjust some to the racial equality of San Francisco - such as the fact that we had a Chinese mayor - though she was still a product of her time, and it showed more often than not.  She was trying though, and I admired her for it.

That wasn't all I admired, either.

I had fallen for her, and I had fallen for her hard.  It didn't help that we shared a bed and often moved about during the night so that I was spooning her.  Which in itself would have been kind of funny - she was taller than me by about an inch - if not for the fact that breathing in her scent for the better part of a night often left me ten kinds of flustered!  But of course, it was more than the scent and how beautiful she was and her cute accent.  It was more than the innocence she retained from a bygone era.  Olga was a very intelligent girl, and despite the fact that she had so much to learn about modern culture, she could hold her own in conversations with Kearny and I, and she showed a genuine drive to learn.  I admired that.  She also was a joy to talk to when she was not feeling melancholy.  (Although sometimes she could be kind of haughty.  Even I had to admit that.  Even then, though, it was kind of cute in a way…)  Oh, it was no use.  I had it bad.  It figured - the first crush I'd had since Julia had dumped me, and it had to be on a long dead grand duchess, who was probably heterosexual anyway!  Just my luck!

She had not yet been alive again for a week when I went into work one day only to see Krista Henderson shaking hands with Dr. Brooks.  Today her power suit, again with a skirt (did she own any pants?), was black and white pinstriped, with a white blouse and black pointy pumps.  I was, as always, confused to see her again.  Why did I keep crossing paths with her in such unlikely places?  An art museum and a bohemian coffee shop were unlikely places for a Republican businesswoman!  Then again, so was the city of San Francisco itself.

Krista sneered down her pert nose - which, I now noticed, she had definitely had work done on - as she passed me on her way out.  I couldn't see the resemblance between her and her mother at all, though perhaps all the Botox that Krista had clearly had was partially the reason.  Even their blue eyes were different - Molly's were happy and Krista's so cold.  _Click clack_ , went her pumps.  _Click clack, click clack_.  I was really growing to hate that sound.

"Ah, Moira!" Dr. Brooks waved me over to his office once Krista had left.  "I, er, wanted to discuss something with you.  Come into my office."

I suddenly felt a little nervous.  First Krista showed up and then Dr. Brooks wanted to talk to me?  Was I going to get fired simply because Krista was mad because her mother thought I was a better owner for the amulet?

"Dr. Brooks?" I asked cautiously as I followed him into his office, shutting the door behind us.  On his desk was an out of date issue of the _San Francisco Chronicle_ , with an article about the attempted robbery.  The photo included didn't translate very well into black and white, for there was a dark shadowy mass in the background.  "Is… everything alright?  Why was Kris- er, why was Miss Henderson here?"

"You know each other?" He arched one of his bushy untamed eyebrows.  How could a man have so little hair on his head and so much over his eyes?

"Not exactly.  I know her mother, kind of."

"Miss Henderson has just made a very generous donation to our museum," Dr. Brooks told me, seemingly out of nowhere.

"She did?" I was surprised.  Perhaps I had misjudged Krista.  

"Moira… Miss Henderson happened to be here the day of the attempted burglary.  No culprit has yet been caught, and she seems to think… Well, please understand that I personally inventoried our stock and have no reason to believe any of my employees guilty.  But, Moira…"

"She thinks I did it!" I cut him off.  "Unbelievable!  Dr. Brooks, I was in the gift shop when it happened, you know that!"  

"Yes, Moira, I do know that. But-"

"But what!?  She gives you a big check so you have to listen to her?!"

"Miss Callahan, don't jump to conclusions.  I am your boss and you will not speak to me that way."

I shrank back a little.  I assumed Krista probably thought I'd stolen the amulet, and was looking for a way to get it put back into her hands.  A convenient attempted robbery gave her an excuse, didn't it?

"Moira," Dr. Brooks broke my train of thought.  "Listen to me.  You're a stellar employee, and you clearly have a passion for many of the pieces in the museum.  I'm not going to fire you.  Still, I think it would be best if we took you off tour shifts for the time being."

"What?  But I love the Romanovs more than anyone, you know that!  I love giving those tours!"

"I'm sorry, Moira.  For the time being, I'm going to have to only schedule you in the gift shop."

Well.  That was just fucking wonderful.  I hated that stupid gift shop.

***

My day didn't get any better when I got back to the dorms.  Kearny and Olga were supposed to be there, according to the schedule that Kearny and I had drafted up.  But the dorm room was empty.  Hm… that was odd…

I poked my head out into the hall, just in time to see Jaycee Hong from across the hall exiting her dorm room.

"Hey, Jaycee," I didn't know her that well, so my tone was hesitant.  "Did you happen to see Kearny come out of here with a strange Russian girl?"

Jaycee paused, then shrugged.  "I dunno, maybe they're in the bathroom or something."

I immediately felt kind of dumb for not having thought of that in the first place.  Of course!  Mumbling a quick thanks, I made my way over to the end of the hall, where the bathrooms for this section of the dorms were.  Sure enough, Kearny was sitting on the counter going at one of her textbooks with a highlighter.

"Where's-" I began, but Kearny cut me off, pointing with her highlighter towards a stall. 

"Your girlfriend locked herself in the bathroom like half an hour ago."

"She's not my girlfriend," I protested, blushing, but Kearny said nothing to that.  I didn't wait for her to reply, anyway.  My concern was mainly for Olga.  I walked over to the stall Kearny had gestured to, ignoring the looks I was getting from the few other girls coming in and out of the bathroom.  I could hear crying from inside the stall and felt my heart just drop into my stomach.  From all I had read on the Romanovs, part of me had always speculated Olga suffered from depression, and so part of me had kind of expected she would eventually break down.  But expecting it was completely different from actually having to hear those heart wrenching little sobs.  I knocked softly on the door.  "…Olga?"

She didn't reply to me at all.  In fact, she gave no indication that she'd heard me, but I knew she had.  I tried again, speaking in a soft tone that I hoped sounded gentle and soothing:

"Olga?  Can you please talk to me?"

"I'm not coming out!" she responded.  At least this time she had talked to me.

"Shhh.  I won't make you come out.  I just want to talk, okay?  Is that okay?"

Again, no response.  I sighed.  This was not going to be easy.

"Olga?  Do you want to tell me what's wrong?" I pressed on.  I was not going to give up, not on her.

I heard her sniffle.  Then, quietly, hesitantly, "…everyone and everything I once knew is… gone.  My family is gone."

I sighed again.  There it was.  I just didn't know what to say to that.

She continued, "Why me?  Why was I brought back and not they?  Alexei, Anastasia, Tatiana, Masha… they all deserved it more than I do!"

"Olga, that's not true!" I responded without thinking.  She sniffled.  "Olga… you… you all deserve a happy ending.  And I'm sorry that I can't bring your siblings back.  Honestly, I don't know why you were brought back and not them… I'm sorry… I'm sorry they're gone, but… they're not forgotten."

She didn't reply.

"I can show you if you want…" I offered.

"…what… what do you mean?"

"If you come with me I can show you…" I tried.  I admit, I was holding my breath - Olga could be stubborn.  Both the academic sources and the short time I'd spent with her showed me that.  But, perhaps worn down from however long she'd been sobbing, she opened the door.  Her face was streaked with tears and snot, and her grey blue eyes were rimmed with dewy red.  Not really thinking too hard about it, I opened my arms, and softly told her, "Come here."  She did.  I hugged her, let her rest her head on my shoulder for the last of the tears.  Then, wordlessly, holding my head high and not looking at anyone else, I wrapped an arm protectively around her shoulder and lead her back to the room.  (Kearny followed us, still looking at her textbook the whole time.  In that moment I was grateful for her ability to remain calm no matter what.)

Once back in the dorm room, I let Olga lean on my shoulder and kept one arm around her as I booted up my laptop with my other arm.  One quick web search later, and my screen was filled with an image of a Russian Orthodox icon of Olga and the rest of her family.  After all, according to some branches of the Russian church, they were martyr saints.

"What is this?" Olga asked, lips pursed.

"Look," I gestured.  "Your family was not forgotten by Russia.  They didn't die in vain.  You're all saints now - people all over to Russia remember you all daily.  I can't bring them back, but… They're not forgotten."

She didn't speak at first.  I exchanged a look with Kearny.  Then… Olga looked like she might cry again.  Shit.

"Oh my god, Olga, no, don't cry!  I'm sorry!  Look, I'm shutting the laptop now, just don't cry!"

"No, no, it is fine, I just…" She sighed.  "I was dead for many years, yes?  I never once heard any prayers to me.  In fact I do not remember being dead at all.  And now I am just realizing… the sainthood is nothing.  There was no heaven, nor any afterlife."

"Oh god…" I felt terrible.  Granted, I myself was not religious, or even spiritual.  Not at all.  Even when I've been lost in my darkest, most desolate times, I've never felt the presence of God, or even been tempted to look for Him.  Long ago, I had turned my back on every flavour of the supernatural.  Religion, the afterlife, ghosts, spirits, the whole lot.  To me, it was all so much superstition.  It was absolutely clear to me - people were so desperate to believe in whatever will comfort them through this chaotic, random, and, ultimately, pointless life.  As far as I was concerned, though, existence was just a happy accident.  Up was up, down was down, and when we died we were nothing but a bag of old guts.

But Olga… in her last life she had been so religious, and even in the middle of a prayer when the gunshots that killed her began.  To lose faith this way… Well, it was just so tragic.  Before I knew it, I was tearing up too, though my tears did not spill over.  Kearny saw this and rushed to my other side, hugging the both of us suddenly.

"Oh, Olga, I'm so sorry…" I whispered.

"No… it's… I am glad you showed me this.  It means my family no longer suffers, and that we are loved after so long.  Which means those who did us in…"

"Reviled," I confirmed.

"Universally hated," Kearny added.  Not technically true - most of the populace probably didn't know about Yurovsky at all - but it seemed to satisfy Olga, who gave us a little nod at that.

"Okay," Olga nodded.  "Yes.  Okay.  I am okay now… I will get ready for bed now, I think.  I'm tired."

"I'll talk to Summer about getting her some Prozac or something," Kearny told me as Olga changed.  I nodded, numbly.  Already, a plan was formulating in my head.  I was determined to make Olga happy.


	9. Morning Fog

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The "Entity" subplot begins, and Moira continues to pine pathetically over Olga

_"We are called to be the architects of the future, not its victims." ~ R. Buckminster Fuller_

 

I rarely had free mornings.  Four days out of seven, I was in one of my lecture courses for at least the latter half of the morning.  (Like many college kids, I disliked waking up early if I didn't have to.)  And I was often scheduled to work in the mornings as well.  So it was somewhat of a welcome surprise on a Thursday morning when I walked to the classroom I normally spent Thursday mornings in, only to find a sign taped on the door informing me that class for that day had been cancelled.  The sign also told me "Happy studying!" as if the instructor intended that just because he didn't come to class it didn't mean we still shouldn't be doing class work.  

I decided _'fuck that'_!

Hurrying back to my dorm, I found Kearny getting ready for her morning class and Olga getting ready for yet another morning at the library.  Kearny gave me a questioning look.

"Class cancelled," I hastily told her, and she nodded her understanding.  "Change of plans.  Olga, you're coming with me today."  At that, I caught Kearny smirking and I rolled my eyes.  "Kearny, not a word."

I figured that today would be a perfect opportunity to introduce Olga to Mrs. Henderson.  After all, Mrs. Henderson had a right to know what her family's amulet had wrought!

***

The address Mrs. Henderson had given me was to half of a charming little duplex in the Nob Hill area.  The porch on the other half of the duplex, the half not belonging to her, flew a rainbow gay pride flag, and sitting on the porch a man in a tee shirt with a coffee mug looked up from today's issue of the _Chronicle_ to wave at us.  Olga moved behind my shoulder a little more - she was not shy, but was still pretty cautious when taken to parts of the City she hadn't yet seen.  (Which, to be honest, was most of it.)

"Does a Mrs. Henderson live on the right side of this building?" I asked, and the man, who I assumed was a gay man, nodded.

"Yeah, Molly lives right next door.  She shouldn't have left yet, either."

"She's going somewhere?" I frowned.  Was now not a good time for this?  I hadn't figured that a little old lady would be at all busy - after all, she was clearly retired - but I wondered if perhaps I had been too hasty in my assumption.

The gay man shrugged.  "Sometimes she likes to walk over to North Beach for coffee in the mornings.  I think she's home now, though."

"Thanks!" I gave him a polite smile, and led Olga up to the door of Mrs. Henderson's half of the duplex, knocking on it.

When she got to the door, Mrs. Henderson looked happy to see us.

"Moira!" She smiled a big grin, which caused happy crinkles around her eyes.  "What a wonderful surprise!  I was wondering when you would come visit me!  And who is this?" She gestured to Olga, looking her over with pursed lips.

"Uh… funny story about her…" I let my voice trail off.

Mrs. Henderson nodded, and told us, "Come inside."

Her house looked as if it hadn't been updated since the seventies, with some things being even older than that, but the only newer thing being a DVD player in the living room, which the front door opened right into.  There was folk art from all over the world, and various trinkets of varying cheesiness all over every available surface.  This house would not be getting in any magazines, soon, but I couldn't help but be kind of charmed by it.  It was homey.  On one of the couches was a fat grey tabby cat.  Olga and I immediately both went right over to pet him, and he seemed pleased by the sudden attention, purring loudly as Mrs. Henderson went to a bookshelf and pulled out a book.

"Olga Nikolaevna Romanov," She said suddenly, turning the book she'd pulled to a photo of the Romanov family - Olga's family.

Olga seemed to go a little pale.  "How did you know?"

Mrs. Henderson laughed.  "Oh, don't worry, sweetie.  That amulet that Moira wears was in my family for awhile after it was in yours.  I've heard stories of what it can do!  Sit tight right there, I'll get us some coffee and biscotti." She walked off to the kitchen, and Olga looked at me.

"Amulet?  What amulet?" She asked.

Sheepishly, I pulled it out of my shirt.  "Um, this one.  We think that somehow it has something to do with your coming back to life, or something.  I'm not really sure.  I don't know a lot about it."

"Let me see," She grabbed it from my hands, unwittingly pulling on the chain around my neck so that our foreheads bumped together.  "Oh!  Sorry!"

"It's fine, it's fine…" I muttered.  Wow, our faces were really close.  I could almost count her eyelashes as I watched her stare at the amulet in her hands for a few seconds with a quizzical expression on her face.  Then, just as suddenly as she had grabbed it, she dropped it and pulled back, turning her attention back to the cat.  It was a few more seconds before she spoke.

"I have never seen that thing in my life."

"I think it belonged to your father," I replied.  In truth, I hadn't thought about which Romanov it had belonged to, but that seemed most likely in my opinion.  "So I don't know if you would have seen it."

"How did the Henderson family get ahold of it then?"

"Ah, no, Henderson is only Mrs. Henderson's family by marriage…"

"…My maiden name is Braginsky," Mrs. Henderson came up behind us, setting a tray on the coffee table and knocking some more books off of it in order to do so.  None of the cups matched, but we gratefully took them anyway.  The tea smelled good, and that biscotti was so tempting.  "Please, call me Molly."

"Braginsky…" Olga muttered, then suddenly smiled.  "Ivan Ivanovich Braginsky.  He was a servant of my father's.  We called him Vanya.  He had such kind blue eyes.  Masha in particular adored him."

Mrs. Henderson - er, Molly - laughed suddenly, and clapped her hands.  "Yes!  He was my grandfather!  He left Russia when all that nasty Bolshevik business started."

Olga frowned.  "Yes.  I wish we had as well.  I knew nothing good would come of it, especially after they forced Papa to abdicate and began moving us around…" She trailed off, and I pat her shoulder and offered her a biscotti.

"Your family deserved better.  To his dying day, my grandfather always insisted that.  I am glad to see, sweetie, that at least you now have a chance for the happy life you deserve." 

Olga blushed, but didn't respond.

"Mrs.- Ah, I mean, Molly…" I began.  "Um… Is there perhaps a history of this amulet written down somewhere?  I'd like to research it more, if at all possible… I mean, if it brought Olga back from the dead, who knows what else it can do?  I don't want to make a habit of accidental necromancy."

"Oh!  Yes, hang on!" Molly rose again and went back to her bookshelf, talking as she began to again peruse it.  "I heard Krista accused you of stealing it from the museum's collection?"

"How did you know?!"

"Well, Krista herself told me the other day she had a theory that my father had donated it back to the Russian government.  As if he would have - my father hated the Soviets and their whole damned system!"

"She told my boss and he put me on permanent gift shop shift," I nodded glumly.  "I don't think your daughter likes me very much."

"Moira, sweetie," Molly turned around holding a few more books, "I told her she was full of rubbish.  Listen.  Krista is my daughter and I love her very much, but she's short sighted is what she is.  She would use that amulet's power to its full extent without even thinking about what consequences it might have!  She'd dabble in dark powers to get ahead in business, never mind who or what gets killed or unkilled along the way!  That is why I want you to have it and not her."

"How do you know Moira is any different?" Olga piped up, then looked at me.  "No offense.  I know you to be different.  But how does Molly know?"

"Because," Molly smiled, "all she did was accidentally bring you back and then try to make you comfortable - you're wearing the blouse she was wearing when I met her, so I can tell.  Besides, I can see how she looks at you, sweetie."

Immediately, I blushed, protesting before Olga could confusedly ask for clarification: "It isn't like that at all!"

Molly laughed, then handed me the books.  One was a family album, and one an old journal.  "This is all I can offer you.  They probably won't have all the answers you seek, but they're a start."

"Thank you," I rose.  

"And thank you for the tea," Olga added, also rising.

"Just come visit me again soon, girls!  At my age, I don't get many visitors!"

As we were leaving, a car pulled up to a nearby parking metro.  Krista Henderson herself stepped out, in yet another skirt suit (plain black this time), and glared at me.  She looked as if she meant to say something, but then she saw Olga.  Her eyes seemed to widen, and then, suddenly, she got back into her little car - which looked expensive - and speeding away.  What on earth had that been about?  Tucking the books Molly had loaned me into my schoolbag, I frowned.

"Was that the Krista woman you mentioned?" Olga asked.

I nodded.  

"I don't know if I like her very much," she added.

I nodded again.  "Yeah, she's kind of a massive bitch." 

Olga blushed - she still tended to blush when hearing such blatant swearing.  Even just that short little glance at Krista had rubbed me the wrong way, and I suddenly realized that I had no intention of attending my afternoon class that day.  I turned to Olga and suddenly grinned.  "Change of plans.  Again."

"Hm?" She stood up a little straighter.  "Where are we going now?"

"It's a surprise!" I realized my grin must have been getting a little manic.  But I didn't care.  We were going to board the F-Market train and I was going to get Olga to smile again like she had when she had been remembering Vanya.  She had such a lovely smile, and I was determined that today I should see it as often as possible!


	10. The Laughter of Saints

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is just pure fluff. Also the locations mentioned this chapter (actually EVERY chapter) are real SF locations, and if you ever find yourself in the City, I highly recommend checking the Musee Mecanique out!

_"I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints, 'cause sinners are much more fun." ~ Billy Joel_

 

Fisherman's Wharf.  It is the cheesiest tourist trap in all of San Francisco, and many locals look upon it with very poorly disguised disdain.  Kearny refused even to come here anymore, claiming she still got "war flashbacks" from when she worked in the Rainforest Cafe, which was located on the wharf.  Normally I avoided the area too, but there were two reasons that I had decided to bring Olga here today, and neither of them involved giving her an "authentic" San Francisco tourist experience.

The first was that there was a Russian restaurant on Beach Street, near the Ripley's Believe it Or Not! Odditorium and the wax museum.  I figured she'd like her version of comfort food.

The second?  Well, that comes much later.  All I knew was that if I couldn't actually take her back in time, I at least could bring a little of the Edwardian era to her.  But I digress.

The coffee and biscotti, while delicious, had not quite been filling.  Besides, we took longer than I would have liked to find the F-Market train - I didn't know the bus lines around Nob Hill very well, being that I never went over there, and we had ended up walking to Chinatown just to catch a MUNI streetcar to the closest BART station!  Regardless, it just so happened that by the time we made it over to the wharf it was lunchtime and we were hungry.

Olga's beautiful grey blue eyes practically bugged out of her skull at the sight of the wharf and Pier 39.  I don't think she even knew where to look.  And, honestly, it hadn't ever occurred to me how weird this part of San Francisco was until just now.  Every type of shop under the sun was sandwiched between the Golden Gate Bridge and the more dull colored (but in my opinion, more architecturally interesting) Bay Bridge.  On every corner there was some type of street performer - from the men who painted themselves like robots and moved like machines, to street musicians playing folk covers of eighties pop songs, to a man dressed like a punk rock clown juggling knives, to the city's infamous "bush man" - a homeless man who carried a fake bush with him.  (Tourists payed him to jump out at their friends.  He was kind of a genius.)  Over all of this noise, of street performers and tourists and street vendors and the Pier 39 carousel, was the ever present loud "Oort!  Oort!  Oort!" of the wharf's beloved sea lion colony, which held hundreds of California Sea Lions.  It wasn't just sights and sounds, either - smells of all kinds filled the air too.  Sea water, food from the vendors, car exhaust, hobo piss - it was all there.  It was a weird place even for people of this era - to her, it must have been positively alien!

When we got off the train at Pier 39, she grabbed my hand, perhaps instinctively.  Half of me was thrilled that such a beautiful woman would be holding the humble hand of little old me, little old Moira Angela Callahan.  Though, I did realize that it was probably not romantic in her mind, and more just grabbing on for safety and security in this hustle and bustle tourist trap of an area.

I looked down at what I was wearing: A black and white vintage polka dot silk blouse, skinny jeans from one of San Francisco's eight Goodwills, and red silk brocade slippers from Chinatown.  It was an outfit designed to go to class, not one I had hoped to wear on a date with this incredible girl who increasingly with each passing day caused my heart to skip more and more beats.  Though, Olga's outfit wasn't exactly date material either - a black lacy maxi skirt from Kearny's work (The H & M in Union Square) and one of my shirts, which was a pale pink and had a small stain on one elbow.  Then again, this was not a date.  Not at all.  I was painfully aware of that fact.

"Moira…" she sounded a little uneasy.

"Don't worry," I assured her.  "I know the area looks weird, but it's actually probably one of the safest places to be, aside from the occasional pick pocket or overly confident seagull with impeccable aim."  I started to laugh a little at my own words, but she stared at me as if I was nuts, so I blushed and cleared my throat.  "Um, are you hungry?"

Olga hesitated, still looking around.  I waited patiently.  I understood.  It was a lot to take in.  Then she nodded.  "But if it is… what do you call them?  Ta-ko?  I don't like them so spicy."

I smiled.  Kearny ate a lot of tacos and tamales and such, when we weren't eating Chinese take out or campus food or pho.  Olga was surprisingly willing to try many things, but we had quickly learned she was not fond of spicy food, which was a shame, especially when we went for Vietnamese, since everyone else - not just Kearny and I, but Summer and Raffi too - liked to douse our pho in Sriracha sauce.

"Nah, we're not getting Mexican.  Come on."

I lead her down the street - right past our next destination, but she didn't know that yet, so it was okay - through throngs of street performers and tourists.  We made it to Beach Street within ten minutes, to our first destination  - a little Russian restaurant called Stroganoff.  It wasn't much - the reviews on Yelp had led me to believe it would be bigger, and it was a little more pricey than I would have liked, but the look on Olga's face was worth it.

"It is Russian food!" She realized right away - after all, the menu was plastered right on the window.  Her mouth began to curve up at the corners into a very, very subtle Mona Lisa smile.  I couldn't help but grin back and squeeze her hand.  

"Come on, then!  Let's go in!"

There were a couple things I noticed about Stroganoff.  First off, it was that nothing about the decor screamed "Russian".  There were no portraits of royals past, no folk art or matryoshkas lying around.  The walls were all either maroon or grey, with gold curtains.  Secondly, there was no music playing, which was a little unusual, though there were enough people in the restaurant that it wasn't completely and utterly silent.  One of the two waitresses that I could see in the place came up to us as soon as we walked in.  She was a petite woman with almost Asian features, though she was clearly naturally blonde with blue eyes.  She spoke with a very heavy Russian accent: "Two of you for lunch?"

I nodded, and we were seated by a window and given menus.  I tried to ignore the prices.  Olga was worth it.  She deserved so much more than I could afford, actually, but this was a great start, for by the time we were seated she was full on grinning.  I practically melted.  She didn't often smile - even before she'd come back, I had only seen three photos total where she was smiling - but when she did, her smiles were radiant and infectious.

"The waitress is Russian as well, yes?" Olga asked, with the giddiness of a child.

"I'm not sure," I shrugged.  "She could just be faking the accent for show.  But maybe she is.  Try ordering in Russian to see what happens."

"What are you going to order?"

"I… don't know…" I looked down at the menu.  Many of the dishes included beef or veal, which I did not eat.  "I can't actually eat some of this stuff…"

"You can have borsch," She pointed out.  

"I dunno, I don't really like beets."

"Just try it!" She pleaded.  I laughed.

"Olga, if you want to get borsch then get borsch!"

"But I want the blintz with red caviar."

I shook my head, laughing again.  "Get both.  It's okay."

The waitress came back to take our orders, and Olga asked her something in Russian.  I didn't understand it, but it sounded a bit like "Yavlyayetsya li borschch belyy ili krasnyy?"  Much to my surprise, the server not only responded in Russian, but looked perfectly happy to actually be speaking Russian with someone instead of talking down to tourists.  They probably chit chatted for at least five minutes before the waitress (Olga later informed me she was called Rika) took our orders.  Olga got her blintz and caviar and her borsch with black tea.  I also ordered the tea, and something called Vareniki, evidently a type of dumpling stuffed with potatoes and caramelized onions.

"I cannot believe there is a little piece of my home here," Olga told me when Rika left our table.

"Eh, stay in the City long enough and you'll find nearly everything."

"As long as we are not finding horrible things," she nodded.  (She'd been reading the _Tales of the City_ series, and had actually yelped at the second book when it got to the part about the cannibal cult of Grace Cathedral.  Still, I approved of Kearny suggesting both that one and the Diary of Anne Frank to Olga - reading them had cut out a lot of work of teaching our Edwardian friend that there were no Elders of Zion and that it was okay to be gay.  Though, she actually took news of homosexuality pretty well.  It didn't seem to phase her as much as San Francisco having a Chinese mayor, or even news of the Holocaust did.  On one hand, her parents had been anti semites.  On the other hand, learning of the sheer brutality of the Nazi regime had shocked her, and she had confessed to us that she didn't think there possibly could be any Elders of Zion conspiracy, for "what kind of powerful organization would allow such horrors to befall their own people?"  I approved immensely.  After all, Olga was a girl who had once said, in her first time being alive, "it is not evil which conquers evil, but only love."  Olga had the desire to be good and loving to everyone, which made Kearny's "education" of her a whole lot easier.)

"I haven't seen anything worse than a hobo's dick once, so I think we're good."

She blushed a little at my comment, and looked down at her hands, which she had folded together in her lap.  "Moira…"

"Hm?  Yes?"

"I… know I have not been the easiest person to be around.  Much of your culture is still strange to me, though I am trying to learn."

"What? Oh, no, Olga, you've been doing great!  And I don't mind teaching you things!"

"Please let me finish… I just… I wanted to let you know I'm very thankful for how kind you have been to me, even before taking me here."

It was my turn to blush.  A Grand Duchess (well, ex Grand Duchess) was thanking _me_?!  "Uh… it's nothing, really."

"It is something, all right."

I smiled at her, albeit a little weakly.  "Hey, what are friends for?"  As much as I would have liked to be more than friends, I did value our friendship for what it was.  That is… "We… are friends, right?"

Suddenly, she smiled again, that warm, infectious grin of hers.  "Yes.  Oh, yes, dear Moira.  I would love it to be considered as such!"  It was as if she was realizing it for the first time herself - and then I realized she probably was.  In her last life her only companions had been her sisters.  I don't think she knew how to have friends.  No wonder she was so happy.

Our food came soon enough.  I burned my tongue a little on the tea.  Olga made me try her borsch, which I did not like.  But other than that, it was delicious.  I have to say, though, the best part was Rika giving us the bill.  For even without tax, the meal should have been thirty six dollars.  The bill read only twenty five.  The waitress, it seemed, had been so happy to have a fellow Russian to converse with that she had given us a discount!  I was all too happy to take out my debit card and shove it in the black leather bill folder.

"What is that?" Olga asked, curiously.  I realized that other than the black flats Kearny had bought her at a thrift shop near campus, with cash, Olga had never seen us pay for anything.  And I also realized that I had absolutely no idea how to explain credit and debit cards, not really knowing how they worked myself.  Rika collected the bill before I spoke.

"Uh… well, when I get paid at my job, the money goes into a bank account.  You know what a bank account is, right?"

"Yes…" she replied, though her tone of voice suggested that she was only just aware of them.

"Right, so these little plastic cards are connected to the bank accounts.  So when I pay with them, the restaurant or business I'm paying reads the little silver strip with a computer and the computer will digitally take the money from my bank account.  Does that make sense?"

"Er…"

"Don't worry," I shook my head.  "I don't fully understand it either, and I'm from this era!"

Rika came back with my card, and I signed the restaurant's copy of the receipt, tipping her as generously as my meager college kid finances would allow.  Olga said good bye to Rika in Russian (That one I did know - "Do Svidaniya") and promised to come back soon as we left.

***

I could barely contain my excitement as I lead her back onto the Embarcadero, back towards the ocean.  Olga was going to absolutely love our next destination, I knew it.  I just knew it!

"Moira, what has gotten into you?"  If I was not mistaken in my giddiness, Olga sounded a bit amused at my sudden bouncy behavior.  But I simply smiled and put a finger to my lips, as if to mime that it was a secret, as I lead her not back to Pier 39, but to the nearby Pier 45.

I watched her face as she took in the old warship and submarine from World War Two, but these were not to be our destination, not now.  No, I continued to lead her past them to a red and white harlequin doorway, with a sign above informing us that this door was the entrance to the Musée Mécanique.

Now, unlike the museum where I worked - in fact, quite unlike most museums I had ever been in - the Musée Mécanique was free.  In fact, it didn't even seem like a museum.  When you walk in this place, it seems more like a typical, if large, arcade - except for the fact that between the skeeball machines and vintage eighties arcade games and pinball machines there were also penny arcade games, "love testers", wind up zoeotrope machines, peep shows, and coin operated automatons dating all the way back to the Victorian era.  The best part is that it's all interactive.  It doesn't matter how old a machine in the place is - guests of this museum are welcome to play with all of them.  Even locals love the place enough to risk the tourist trap environment it's hidden in.

"What is this place?" Olga leaned in to whisper at me.  I didn't know why she felt she had to whisper - after all, it was quite loud, with all the whizzes and bangs coming from machines both old and new.

"You have heard of penny arcades, right?"

Her lips began to curve into that Mona Lisa smile again.  "I… was never allowed to go to one."

"Well guess what - today you are.  Come on!  What do you wanna see first?"

"Let's just cycle around and see all of it!"

I pulled a twenty dollar bill out of my pocket, straightened it on a corner of a wall, and shoved it into a change machine.  (Twenty dollars in quarters may seem like a lot, but trust me, in a place such as this it goes quickly.)  We began with "Laffing Sal", a six foot tall automaton straight out of the uncanny valley and began to just cycle around, stopping to check out music boxes and various little moving contraptions, such as a "barbershop quartet", a few mock executions, and even an Opium Den.  

"Oh, man, the Victorians were morbid…" I muttered as Olga enjoyed the animation in one of the mutoscopes - the oldest machine in the place.  The animation was simple enough - just a girl jump roping - but I was pleased to see her enjoying herself so much as she wound it up.

At the end of the first row was the back of the one room museum, where the arcade machines from the eighties were kept.  I had no plans to play Galaxia or Mrs. Pac Man, but there were two identical machines that I wanted to try with her.

"Hey Olga, you ever hear of skeeball?"  I was fairly sure she hadn't - I didn't know how old it was, but it didn't seem like something pre-revolutionary Russia would have had.  Still, it was polite to ask.

"No…" she looked at where I was looking.  "It looks simple enough, though.  You just throw the balls into those little holes?"

"Wanna see who can get a higher score?" I grinned.  

"I don't know…" But she was smiling too.  She clearly wanted to.

"Come on," I tossed her a quarter.  "You take the right one, I'll take the left.  Loser has to… um…"  I had been planning to say the loser had to buy the winner something, but then I remembered that Olga had no money, not here in modern day San Francisco.  On top of that, would she even bet?  Or would it be another thing that made her uneasy - despite rather sadly losing her faith, her upbringing still reared its head from time to time.

"Loser has to do something completely of the winner's choosing," She shot me a small smile.  I was completely taken by surprise in the most amazing way.  Olga would never cease to amaze me, it seemed.

"You sure you want to do this?" I feigned cockiness.  "I've lived here longer than you, I have an unfair advantage."

"We will see about that, won't we?" Well, how about that?  One of the last royals of Russia had a competitive side, it seemed.

It turned out, I just barely beat her out.  She scored 110, I scored 120.  I laughed.  

"Looks like I'm the winner!" I winked at her.  "Hm, what _ever_ shall I force you to do, my dear?"

"Oh, do not tease me so!"

I laughed again.  "I'll decide later, come on."

We circled around and I couldn't help but want to play the Addam's Family pinball machine.  To my surprise, Olga didn't ask about either the Addam's Family, or about what pinball was.  She just watched the machine as I played, racking up a rather impressive score, if I do say so myself, of 16, 182, 810.  (Okay, so I've always rather liked pinball.)  This earned a free game, which I asked Olga if she wanted to take.  She readily agreed, quickly picking up on how to play pinball (not that it's too hard), though her score was only three million and something.  (I confess I was more watching her face contorted in concentration than the score at that point…)

We continued cycling around to an old fortune telling machine, with a sign nearby warning us to "Be careful with these machines - most of them are older than you'll ever be!"  I snorted at that.  If only the owner of this museum knew Olga had been born around the same time as some of the really old machines here!  As if on cue, at that moment an older man - I would have estimated him to be in perhaps his fifties, though I confess to not being the best at guessing ages - whizzed by on roller skates.

"Having fun?" he asked us with a good natured grin.

I nodded.  "I love this place!  I wish I could tell the owner what a great thing it is that he keeps this place running so well!"

The man laughed, and held out his hand for a handshake, which I readily took.  "You're in luck - I'm the owner!  Dan Zelinsky, at your service."

"Really?!" My voice took on a bit of a gushing tone as he shook Olga's hand.  "Wow!  Oh, wow, I just wanna say it's so, so great what you do here!"

"Yes," Olga nodded her agreement.  "It was a very pleasant surprise to discover so many machines from before the Great War!  It's been very enjoyable so far, and we haven't even seen everything yet!" 

"I'm flattered," Mr. Zelinsky looked down, and then laughed a little.  He was evidently very humbled by our gushing.  "I… Wow.  Thank you.  This is exactly why I do this.  I love these machines.  I love the smiles on people's faces."

"If you love what you do, you'll never have to work a day in your life," I nodded.

"Exactly," He smiled.  "Where are you girls from?"

"Oh, I'm from here," I said.  "Well, I mean, I live in San Francisco.  My name's Moira, this is my friend Olga.  She, uh… she just moved here recently, from Russia."  It wasn't technically a lie.

His smile grew.  "Well, I'm glad you two like my museum!  I'll see you around!"  With a jovial wave, he rode off again on hose old school roller skates again.

"I liked him," Olga informed me.

"Yeah, he was really nice," I agreed.

We passed more of the peep shows, and I couldn't help but be intrigued by one in particular.  Most of them held promises either of something provocative or something horrifying, with images and pictures above the machines with titles such as "See what the bellydancer does on her day off!", "Tiger Vs. Snake", "Real photos of the 1906 earthquake!", and "What Every Married Woman Must Not Avoid".  This one?  No pictures of anything to give any hint of what it held, just the title "XXX".  

"Oh my god," I shook my head, then took on a joking tone.  "Is there Victorian porn in this here arcade?  Scandalous!"

Olga frowned.  "Those things always promise more than they show.  Even so, they're terribly improper."

"More improper than a woman wearing pants?" I pointed at my jeans.

She blushed.  "Well, your culture is different than my own…"

"Oh, come on, that is such a cop out!  Look!" I gestured to a nearby heterosexual couple.  The man was playing against one of those old time arm wrestler machines, with his girlfriend watching and playfully teasing him.  She was in a tank top and short shorts.  "I bet the woman in this peep show machine is way more covered up than this lady over here."

"Moira…"

"Come on, just watch it with me!  We totally have to with a title like that!  Besides, I beat you at Skeeball, remember?"

She looked a little uneasy still, and I softened.

"Okay, Olga, if you really don't want to, I won't make you.  But I still wanna see what it's all about."

Olga then did that thing I had noticed she did sometimes, where she looked extra determined and stood up a little straiter, jutting her jaw out just a tiny, almost unnoticeable, bit more than it had been before.  "No, I will look too."

Just a tad taken aback, I brandished a quarter.  "Well.  Alright then."

Into the machine the quarter went, and though it was made for one viewer, we both looked in at once.  I had to force myself to focus on the machine itself and not the fact that our faces were quite literally pressed together, to the point where I could smell her and it was causing a lump in my suddenly very dry throat.  The machine operated somewhat like a flip book, but with photographs.  The photos showed a woman in late Victorian dress - I would have guessed late 1880s, as she didn't have the Gibson Girl look of the Gay 90s and beyond - at a desk.  In came a man who tried to kiss her, when she clearly didn't want it.  I gulped.  Was this going to get problematic?  It's not as if the Victorian era was renowned for equal rights.  Then again, I could make that argument about my own era as well… 

Much to my shock and delight, though, the woman grabbed the old man, threw him off of her and started beating the crap out of him!  It was over within twenty seconds, but I couldn't help but start to laugh.  Olga saw how hard I was laughing and she started laughing too - and it was the most beautiful, musical sound I had ever heard.  We must have looked like nuts, hanging onto the walls around this old machine that promised porn and gave violence instead, laughing so hard that tears came to our eyes.  But I didn't care - I would have given anything to preserve that very moment forever.

"Still smiling I see!" Mr. Zelinsky skated past us and we both nodded, still laughing a little as we waved.

We continued our cycle around the museum, looking at various machines.  There was an old school pinball machine, from maybe the forties or fifties, which intrigued me enough for a play, though I didn't win a free game on that one.  Olga and I also played an old racing game - the cars were made to go by us winding little levers in circles, so it wasn't quite like a modern arcade game.  I would have let her win except for the fact that she cheated, pushing me a little with her shoulder when my car began to beat hers.  I didn't mind so much.  It was all in good fun, and she was still laughing as she did it.  God, she was adorable… 

Eventually, though, we had seen everything, and my twenty dollars in quarters was long gone.  We left the museum in good spirits, only to be confronted with a street performer almost directly outside the building.  He was an older black gentleman with only a synthesizer.  I'd seen him before - he played covers of sixties and seventies (and sometimes eighties) music.  Right now, he was in the middle of the Temptations' "My Girl".

I don't know what possessed me to do this.  Maybe I was high off of hearing Olga laugh so much.  But before I knew it, I had grabbed her hand and coerced her into dancing in the streets with me until the song was over.  And you know what?  Even though it was rather out of character for me - I wasn't a great dancer - it made her laugh even more.

We boarded another streetcar on the F-Market line, intending to transfer to a MUNI bus back to the University at a later stop.  

"Why is this streetcar different from the other one?  The other one was yellow and this one is green," Olga asked as we got on.

"Oh, this one is from Chicago." When she looked confused, I explained.  "F-Market is a weird line.  Instead of the streetcars that the rest of MUNI uses, this one uses old streetcars from defunct public transportation lines all over the world.  Judging by the style of this one it's probably from the fifties.  Neat, huh?"

She looked around, then nodded.  "It is neat, yes.  This city continues to surprise me… you know, I used to think I would never want to be anything but Russian.  But… if I have to pick a new home, I am okay with it being here.  San Francisco is…" She struggled to find a word, settling for,  "certainly not boring."

I beamed.  "I'm pleased you find it so."

"Thank you very much for today, Moira.  It was cold!" She gushed.  It was my turn to be confused.

"Actually the weather wasn't too bad today."

"What?" She asked.  "No, I mean… you say things are cold when you like them, yes?"

"Oh.  Oh!  You mean it was cool!"

"Yes, but if it is very cool then it is cold!"

I laughed a little.  That was adorable.  "You know, I've never heard anyone say that before."

"Oh…" She blushed a little, and I shook my head.

"No, it's okay.  It's… it's cold."

She laughed again, and my heart soared.


	11. Conversations Over Pizza

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which not a lot happens. But you still shouldn't skip this one.

_"If it's true that our species is alone in the universe, then I'd have to say the universe aimed rather low and settled for very little." ~ George Carlin_

 

We got back to the dorm room in rather good spirits.  In fact, this was probably the happiest that I had ever seen Olga.  Usually her moods, even good ones, were tainted with an air of melancholy, which, to be honest, was totally understandable, all things considered.  The day, it seemed, had been a success in its primary goal, which had been to cheer her up.  (The secondary goal - getting her to fall completely head over heels in love with me - had not been so successful, to my knowledge, but the important thing was that I had made her laugh.)

So it was more than a little surprising, not to mention unnerving on my end, to come back to the dorm room only to discover Kearny, Summer, and Raffi all sitting in a semicircle on the floor around a pizza.

"Uh…" I frowned, setting my schoolbag down, "What's going on?  Is this, like, an intervention?"

"Hardly," Kearny rolled her eyes.  "Though you're totally late.  You missed out on more absolutely thrilling apartment hunting."

I nearly choked on my own spit.  I had completely forgotten my original plan for the day was to go look at more apartments with the girls after class.  "Shit, I'm so sorry!  I totally forgot!"

"You should be sorry," Kearny continued, with a cheeky grin.  "You missed out."

"We think we may have found the place," Raffi clarified, and Kearny punched his shoulder.  "Ow!  What the heck was that for?"

"I wanted to tell her, asshole."

"That's great!" I was surprised, and also relieved - summer (the season, not the girl) drew closer and closer, and I really did not want to spend another summer in San Jose and having to commute up to work all the time.  It was absolute hell on Betty Lou.  "What makes you so sure though?"

"We're not sure," Summer (the girl, not the season) started to say, but was cut off by Kearny:

"Oh my god, Moira, you have to see this place.  The kitchen is adorable - the last couple who owned it was like super into the whole rockabilly thing, so it looks totally fifties.  The oven and stove are green!  It's green and yellow, totes cute!"

"It's three bedrooms like we asked, though they're pretty small," Raffi added on calmly (he was always calm), as Summer shot Kearny a dirty look for interrupting her.  "And the living room has a balcony - too small for a table, but you could probably get a chair or two out there - that looks out onto the street below.  It doesn't allow any pets, not even fish tanks, but it's in our price range and doesn't seem to have any infestations or anything."

"It sounds incredible," I said.  "What's the catch?"

Kearny and Raffi exchanged looks, and Summer suddenly looked very focused on the homework she had evidently brought with her, but no one said anything.  I frowned.

"Come on guys, what is it?"

"Well it's really close to my work," Kearny began, "and to Summer's…"

"It's in the Tenderloin?!" I exclaimed.  "You guys!"  The one thing I had asked for when we began looking for an apartment was not to get one in the Tenderloin.  It was basically the anus of San Francisco.

"Technically," Summer replied, "it's not in the Tenderloin.  It's like right on the border between the Tenderloin and downtown."

"Still…" I turned to Olga and gestured for her to have a seat on my bed, which she did, looking very confused.  Then I went and kneeled by Kearny, trying to be quiet as I muttered.  "Kearny, I don't mean to be that guy - er, that girl - but I really don't feel safe in that area of the City.  And even if I did, it's one thing entirely for us to walk over drug addicts and hobos and shit streaked graffiti covered walls, but, I mean, we have Olga now, and if the area makes even native San Franciscans uneasy, how do you think she might react to it?"

"Hey, I didn't ask for you to resurrect a dead princess or duchess or whatever she is."

"Shush!" I gestured to Raffi and Summer, who were ignoring us in favor of pizza and homework, respectively.

"Oh would you relax?  I already told them!"

"Kearny!"

"What?  As if I was really going to let you take her along when we move out and not tell our future housemates," she stopped whispering, and I hung my head, suddenly aware that Olga was now watching us, as she was probably aware we were talking about her.  I didn't know what to say.  I didn't want Olga to think I regretted bringing her back to life, because I didn't.

Eventually I settled on saying - not whispering, lest Olga think I had anything to hide from her, which… I didn't think I did, other than the whole crush thing - "And?"  I figured I'd let Kearny draw her own conclusions.

"Well, Raffi believed me," she shrugged.

I turned to Summer, who was now inspecting a very confused Olga.  "Summer?"

"I think the resemblance is uncanny, and so it's likely that she believes she's the real Olga Romanov," Summer muttered, possibly not aware she was speaking out loud.  Olga bristled.

"You think I am a liar?"

"Uh, guys?" I jumped up to sit next to Olga, somewhat defensively, before Summer could ruin her good mood.  Summer was logical to the point where her mind literally would not accept anything that fit into her viewpoint of the world.  Her atheism made my lack of faith look like fundamentalist Christianity, that's what a skeptic she was. 

Summer shook her head, and gestured to one of those little lunchbox coolers which I had not noticed before.  "Regardless of beliefs for which there is no scientific proof, Kearny did talk to me about some things.  So I brought some things from work - vaccinations, and three prescriptions - filed under your name, Kearny's, and Raffi's - of a generic form of Zoloft.  For your… friend."

"I have had vaccinations," Olga said.  I smiled at her, and she visibly calmed down a little.

"Not for Polio or Smallpox or any of those," Kearny piped up.  

Summer sat up on the other side of Olga and opened her cooler, handing me a very full bottle of pills - Olga's antidepressants - and taking out some rubbing alcohol.  "Roll up your sleeve," she instructed Olga.  "And Moira, I'd appreciate if you didn't tell anyone about this because me taking these from work is probably very very illegal."

"I appreciate it so much, Summer," I nodded my understanding, then turned to Olga.  "Do you need to, like, squeeze my hand or something?"

She shook her head.  "No.  I have had vaccinations before, and given them as well.  You forget I worked as a nurse for a short time."

"Ah.  Right."  She had been a nurse for soldiers during World War One, along with Tatiana and their mother Alexandra, though Olga herself had to stop nursing after what many historians speculated was a nervous break down from the high amount of stress.  Too bad the Russians of the time didn't have Zoloft.  I certainly hoped it helped her.

As Summer was administering Olga's shots and instructing her on how to take the pills, I sat back down with Kearny and Raffi and grabbed my schoolbag, pulling out the books that Molly Henderson had let me borrow.

"What're those?" Kearny grabbed one, the photo album, and began flipping through before I could answer.  "Oh, awesome!  Raffi, look at these old photos!"

I'd told Kearny a little about Molly before, so I began telling her and Raffi (no use trying to keep stuff from him now) about what she'd said about the amulet and my quest to find out more history on it.  Midway through this mini lecture of mine, I realized Kearny looked very focused on one page - and was thus not listening.

"Kearny?" I asked.

"Hm?" She looked up.  "Oh, sorry, I just… A lot of these photos have weird anomalies in them."

"Well yeah, they're old," I shrugged.

"I've counted at least fifteen spectral orbs," Raffi added.

"Oh please," I could hear Summer scoff behind me.  "It's probably dust or something.  Those old cameras weren't exactly reliable."

Raffi rolled his eyes.  "Even so, ignoring those, look."

I obliged, looking over where he and Kearny were pointing.  It was a family portrait in front of a window.  In the window was a black shadowy mass, similar to the one I'd seen in the newspaper on Dr. Brooks's desk.  I would have just brushed this off as a coincidence, albeit a strange one, if not for the fact that one of the two children in the photo was staring directly at the window with a look of fear.

"You've heard of Shadow People, right?" Raffi asked with an air of mystery, as if he was imparting some sort of gravely important information.

"Oh please," Summer said again.

But I wasn't so sure as Summer was.  I had heard of Shadow People.  Though ghost lore wasn't my thing, and I didn't count myself as a believer, I did admit to occasionally catching the tail end of certain ghost hunter shows when Kearny and Raffi watched them together - as a guilty pleasure, nothing more.  I used to think it was all just superstition, or maybe there was a scientific explanation like the Stone Tape theory.  (Which is a theory that speculates that inanimate materials can absorb energy from living beings, this "psychic energy recording" later being played back like a tape.  Thus, ghosts being like a non-interactive recording, like a movie or something.)  But now?  Could I really be so sure of anything after finding a mystical amulet and resurrecting a dead body?  How could I say science was the be all and end all, like Summer did, when on my bed was someone who had died almost a century ago?

"I don't… really know a lot about it.  Or about the amulet.  These books were supposed to help me learn more, not raise more questions."  I sighed.

From behind me, Olga spoke.  "So go look at the library."  

I could see the logic behind her suggestion - she spent a lot of time in the library, and had learned so much from it, thanks to Kearny giving her reading lists on various topics, designed to bring her thinking process into the modern age.  Still, "I don't think the library has a really large section on, like, the occult and stuff."

"San Francisco does not have an occult library?  Your city seems to have everything else."

"Not that I'm aware of, no," I shook my head.

"But…" Raffi began, and we all turned to him.  He looked at me oddly.  "Moira, you didn't know?"

"Didn't know what?"

"San Francisco doesn't have an occult library, this is true… but San Jose does."

I frowned.  What on earth was he talking about?  I had lived in San Jose all my life, and though we had a really large library downtown, I think I would have known if we - and then I gasped as it hit me.  Of course!  I'd completely forgotten about it!

"What is San Jose?" Olga asked.

"It's where Moira is from," Kearny offered helpfully.  "And they have-"

"-The Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum and Park!" I cut her off excitedly.  "On the campus of the park - it's run by a not so secret Secret Society - there's a research library devoted to 'secret knowledge'.  Of course!  Oh!  We should go on Sunday, when I'm not working!"

"Okay," Olga agreed readily.  "I am interested, I admit, in seeing where you grew up."

"Okay," Kearny sighed.  "But sometime before that you have to agree to go look at that apartment with us!"

"Okay, fine, whatever!" I agreed to this.  But my mind wasn't on the apartment.  It was on all the mystical and occult topics I would have to go study.  I made a mental note to alert Skyler - and not to tell my mother I would be back in town.


	12. Journey to the Tenderloin and Beyond

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Moira talks to her boss, looks at yet another freaking apartment, and learns more about that pesky Entity

_"Love is blind; friendship closes its eyes." ~ Friedrich Nietzsche_

 

Even with my mind not on the apartment, the fact remained that I was to go look at it with Summer.  Kearny and Raffi were going to take care of Olga while I did so - I wasn't quite ready just yet to explain the Tenderloin to her.  Before that, however, I did have to deal with some real life problems too.  First off, I had totally been neglecting studying for finals, which were approaching rather quickly.  I began scrambling to find the topics for my research papers.  I figured I'd make use of the trip I was taking to San Jose and do one on Ptolemaic Egypt, or perhaps the Justinian and Theodora era of Byzantine history, since I already had to look up stuff from that time anyway in order to study the amulet.  No such luck with my French Rev professor though - why oh why had I elected to take an entire class on one of the most confusing times of all of European History?  Damn the French Revolution.

And secondly, my job was an ever present pain in my arse.  The gift shop at the Palace of Legion of Honour is not very big, and it's mostly books that we sell, in addition to jewelry and trinkets and posters of our more popular art pieces and, of course, the same postcards that every single fucking place in San Francisco has to sell: The Golden Gate Bridge, the Painted Ladies of Alamo Square, the California Sea Lions of Pier 39, the Cable Cars.  Ugh.  Was this what it was like to hate one's job?  I'd always rather liked mine - one of my favourite paintings of all time was held in this museum, after all, and I loved walking visitors and groups of old people and school children (not so much teenagers, who rarely wanted to be there.  Old people and little kids made for the best tour groups.) through different eras of history.  Oh, damn Krista Henderson!

Which is why I was surprised, after like two or three weeks of this, when I went to eat lunch.  I'd forgotten to pack a lunch today, which was a mega bummer.  There weren't a lot of options within Lincoln Park as far as food, and I didn't have time to take a bus elsewhere.  Which meant I'd have to get food in the museum cafe.  Don't get me wrong, the Palace had excellent food, but it was a bit pricey.  One latte and vegetarian burger (on a brioche bun with hand made sauce - for a fucking burger) later, I was sitting in a corner of the cafe, under a framed print of my favorite painting - which was, of course, Konstanin Makovsky's "The Russian Bride's Attire".  I ignored the other patrons of the cafe as my coworker Phil - in the cafe's weird uniform of a red and white horizontally striped shirt under a bow tie and apron with red and white vertical stripes - brought me my food.

"Don't you usually eat lunch in the break room?" he asked me with a cheeky smirk.

"And miss out on watching all the old people?  What's the matter, Phillip, wanna get rid of me?"

"Leave a big mess for me," he teased.

"Oh, you know it," I waved him off and turned attention to my food.

All this, of course, was not the surprising part.  No, the surprising part was when a little egg shaped man in a tweed suit with round glasses and a bald head sat down opposite me.

"Dr. Brooks?" I blinked my confusion.  I was aware of Phil and the other cafe workers staring at us curiously.  It wasn't like Dr. Brooks to mingle with his coworkers.

"I'm sorry, is this seat taken?" He asked me.  I wasn't sure if he was serious or joking - with Dr. Clifford Brooks, one could never quite tell.

"N- no!" I sputtered.  "By all means!"  What on earth was this about?

"I wanted to discuss something with you, Moira."  Ah, there it was.  Of fucking course.

I gulped and hid my face with a sip of my coffee.  The thought crossed my mind that I might be getting fired - in the middle of a public cafe so I didn't make a scene no less!  (Ha, like I would make a scene!  I wasn't that type of girl - more the type to look down and cry pathetically.  I was spirited when happy, but I couldn't really handle conflict.  I tended to retreat into myself.)

But I was not going to get fired, not today.  Because, much to my surprise, Dr. Brooks's next words were, "How would you feel about being put back on tour shift?"

"R- really?!"

"Well, we have had weeks without incident," his lips curved up in such a way that I couldn't tell if he was smirking or grimacing.  "Now, of course, you understand I cannot put you on tours for the special collection."

"I understand," I nodded quickly.  As much as not being able to talk about the Romanovs all day would be a small bummer, Dr. Brooks didn't know I got to cuddle one of them every night.  

"But I can put you on regular tours."

"Yes!  Excellent!" I nodded, shoving the rest of my burger into my mouth as I nodded rather enthusiastically.  "When can I start?"

"How does this Sunday sound?"

I frowned.  "S- Sunday?"

"Is there a problem Moira?"

Well, only that Sunday I had already planned an expedition to San Jose, one that Olga and Skyler both were looking forward to.  I couldn't let them down - my biggest crush ever and my best friend since childhood!

"Uh… I was scheduled to have Sunday off, so I kind of… already made plans?" I offered weakly, sinking down into my seat a little.

"Monday then," he nodded.

Excellent!  I agreed to this readily.

***

The next day, I met Summer in Union Square beneath the statue of Alma Spreckles.  (Which I had always thought she had an excellent name.  The names "Alma" and "Spreckles" weren't too terribly fabulous on their own, but together it was like something out of a story book and I couldn't help but kind of love it.)

"Here," she handed me a cup from a local coffee shop.  "A chai tea latte to bribe you not to fuck with the landlord too much.  Though, since chai just literally means tea, they shouldn't call it chai tea.  That's like saying tea tea."

"Thanks for the tea tea latte, Summer," I grinned.  "So where is this place?"

"Right up the road," She gestured, and we began to walk.

"How are med school applications going?" I asked, sipping my chai latte as I made small talk.

"They suck," Summer deadpanned.  I sighed.  I couldn't imagine what hell med school apps were.  She probably didn't wanna talk about it.  Before I could think of what else to ask, Summer herself brought up something.  "So what's with your new girlfriend?  She's obviously an immigrant, but does she honestly believe she's a princess who's been dead a century?"

"A grand duchess, not a princess.  And it hasn't been a century yet.  And yes, she does, because she is Olga Romanov.  I know you don't believe me but she just is, okay?  I don't really understand it anymore than you do."

"But that isn't scientifically possible," she argued.  I loved Summer, but she could be irritating to talk to sometimes, due to her sourly stubborn nature.

"Yeah, well," I frowned, "maybe science just doesn't have all the answers."  Immediately, I felt a little emptier for having said such a cliche thing - it was an argument that had been used against me before, due to my own atheistic tendencies.  What was I saying?

"Au contraries," Summer smirked.  "Science has the answer to every question ever asked.  However, science reserves the right to change that answer should additional data become available."

"Whatever, Bill Nye," I shoved her playfully, and she laughed a little.  And just like that, we were friends again.

"Okay, okay, I won't ask about it anymore.  But if she ever decides she is ready for therapy…"

"I don't really want to talk about it Summer.  Why does it even matter?  You forget we live in a city that once had an emperor."

"All hail Emperor Norton," She rolled her eyes.  "Come on, here's the building across the street."

We crossed the street and were greeted not only the sight of a building, but the charming sight of a really dirty hobo with, I'm not kidding, his penis in his hands.  Just right out in the open for everyone to see.  This was a perfect representation of why I didn't want to move anywhere near the Tenderloin - it wasn't that I was a stranger to public nudity, not living in San Francisco (where it was weird to go more than two weeks _without_ seeing a dick), but there was a fine fine line between a little harmless public nudity and full on hobo masturbation.  And if I reacted like this, what would poor dear Olga think? I elbowed Summer. 

"Oh, don't be such a baby.  Just ignore it," She rolled her eyes as she hooked her elbow into mine and we met the - landlord?  Real estate agent?  I don't really know what he was - in the lobby, which was a mixture of art deco and midcentury modern.  I was a little sad Kearny wasn't with us.  Summer wouldn't make serial killer jokes with me.  Then again, now that I was dating a murder victim they weren't really as funny anymore anyway.

The apartment itself was… actually not bad.  It was on the fourth floor of the building.  The door opened into the kitchen, and behind the kitchen was the living room slash dining room.  The kitchen was done in yellow and green, just like Kearny had said - apparently the landlord allowed them to renovate a kitchen that severely needed it after a fire, and the couple who owned the place (who had recently moved to Portland) ran with it.  On one side was a hallway leading to two small bedrooms, and on the other a third bedroom and a bathroom.  All the bedrooms were just large enough for one bed and one dresser, not very big at all, and it was an odd design.  Also, the building had a parking garage but no washing machines, so we would have to go to the nearest laundromat - in the heart of the Tenderloin - to wash our clothes.  If we moved here.  Was it worth it?

"So what do you think?" Summer asked, somewhat cautiously, as we left.

"I'll think about it," I told Summer.  I kind of wished Olga had come - I would have liked her opinion.  I wanted her to know I did value it, even if she was technically a paperless illegal immigrant (wasn't she?) and couldn't help with rent anyway.  But then again, I was so nervous about introducing her to this part of the City.  I didn't want to give the poor thing more to be upset about.  

Then again, the apartment hadn't been as bad as I had been picturing, though it was just barely within our price range.  And that kitchen was super cute, even if the tiny little balcony from the living room slash dining room did look out straight into the Tenderloin…

"Well, think about it fast," Summer told me.  "There's a little family that wants to look at it some more too, so it's a matter of timing."

"What?  You didn't tell me about that!"

"Yeah," Summer nodded.  "So if we get it, I have to move in on my own and you all have to take turns spending nights with me until you all can get out of the damned dorms."  Summer lived with her parents still, so she could afford to do that.

***

"You're back!" Kearny greeted me as I later stepped into the dorm room.  She and Raffi were cuddled on her bed - it was gross how cute they were, and I wondered secretly if Olga and I would ever be that gross - looking through a…

"Is that a 'Where's Waldo' book?" I frowned, confusedly.

"Checked it out from the library," Raffi nodded with a grin.  "Before you judge, these things are freaking hard."

"I wasn't judging," I looked over at Olga, who was on my - our - bed, reading more of whatever book of the _Tales of the City_ series she was on.  (I had lost count of which was which at this point.)

"Hey, did you like the apartment?" Kearny jumped up, leaving Raffi to find Waldo on his own.

"I haven't even put my purse down yet."  Setting my purse down, I nodded, "It's… not bad, for its location.  The kitchen is adorable, you were right about that.  The bedrooms are tiny, but I guess I should have expected that, trying to find three bedrooms on our budget…"

"So…?" Kearny prodded me to continue.

"I don't know," I shrugged.  "I just don't know.  I'm still iffy over that area."

"It's not like living in the Tenderloin means having to spend all your time in the Tenderloin," Raffi pointed out.  "Summer lives over by Chinatown and she's over here all the time.  Plus there's this great little Vietnamese place, Pho Tan Hoa, over there."

"Moira Mouse," Kearny sighed, and I could see Olga quirking an eyebrow, either at the nickname or her book, "I don't mean to be a major nag, but…"

"I know, I know, Summer told me a little family was looking at it too."

Kearny blinked.  "I was actually going to say our time here in the dorms runs out soon, and I know you don't want to move back in with your mom, especially not with, you know," She gestured with her face to Olga on my bed, and I realized she was absolutely right.  I hadn't told anyone in my family about Olga yet.

"Oh…" I looked down stupidly.

"You know, I can still hear you two and I know you are talking about me," Olga didn't look up from her book.

Kearny shook her head with a small smile. "Anyway, here, let me take your mind off it.  Raffi and I were gonna go to the Castro theatre next week on Saturday night, they're playing 'Some Like It Hot', tickets are only like five bucks… If you two wanted to go…"

"Kearny, I need to study for finals, I've been like super bad about it this semester, what with, you know, everything."

"Still here," Olga piped up.  "Still can hear you."  She had evidently been taking snarking lessons from Kearny.  Either that, or she was naturally snarky and it was coming out more now that she knew us better

"I'm not just talking about you, Olga," I shot her a smile.  She looked up just in time to see me brandish the pendant from under my shirt.  She gave a small smile, nodded, and looked back down at her book.  "I dunno, though.  I'll think about it."

"Raffi will pay for Olga if you want."

"Hey," Raffi protested, but Kearny waved a hand at him to shut him up.

"I don't know, I haven't really shown her any movies yet beyond, like, the zoetropes and stuff at the Musée Mécanique."

"You went to the Musée Mécanique without us?" Raffi mocked offense, putting on a fake pout.  Kearny waved her hand at him again.

"Oh, relax, she'll be fine!  We already watched 'The Breakfast Club' on my laptop earlier and she was fine.  Right, Olga?  You were fine with it."

"I was fine," Olga nodded, not looking up.

"Aw," I wilted a little.  "You took her John Hughes virginity without me?"

"Fuck off," Kearny replied, her liberal use of the F word causing Olga to blush a little, as my poor dear still did whenever people swore so freely.  "It's my favourite movie of all time and you know it."  Kearny paused, and frowned.  "Even if it does have the most unnecessary makeover scene of all time, thus perpetrating the beauty myth that plagues modern society… Still, a solid movie!"

I smirked.  Kearny did that sometimes.  "Careful, K. G. B.  Your feminist side is showing."

"Good!  I want it to!"

I couldn't help but laugh a little.  "I'll think about it, okay?"  I turned to Olga.  "What do you think?"  I didn't want to decide for her.  She wasn't a baby.  She was smart, and adapting surprisingly well to modern society.  I had to give her credit for that, and I definitely had to respect her decisions on the matter.

Olga shrugged, closing the book and bookmarking it.  "I will think about it as well."

"Great," I nodded.  "Hey, do you wanna go meet Molly for dinner tonight?  I wanted to ask her some things."

"Do you know if she will be home?" Olga asked, and I shrugged.

"No, but if she's not we'll just walk over to Chinatown and grab some food, no big deal."  I turned to Kearny and Raffi.  "You guys wanna come?"

"Nah," Kearny grinned.  "But thanks for the invite.  I think we already agreed to go out for Ethiopian tonight and then pull an all night study session.  Besides, Raffi still hasn't found Waldo yet."

Raffi didn't look up from the book, but did hold up his left hand to his girlfriend and slowly extended the middle finger.

***

It turned out that, thankfully, Molly Henderson _was_ home.  Not that it would have mattered too much.  (Okay, so it should have mattered - I really did want to talk to Molly about certain things - but anytime I was alone with Olga was special to me.  Yeah.  I had it pretty bad at this point.  Maybe Kearny was right - maybe I was going crazy from sexual frustration.)

"Moira!  Olga!  Good to see you!" Molly was thrilled to have company.  "Come, come in!  Sit, sit, these old bones don't stand as well as they used to.  Here, let me hollow out two more bread bowls."  Her dinner that night was sourdough bread bowls and canned soup.  She'd made herself clam chowder.  "Pick a can from the pantry there!"

Molly's kitchen, which did double duty as a dining room, was much like her living room - cluttered, old fashioned… homey.  Well worn.  I liked it.  I noticed a framed photo on the linoleum tile counter near the pantry.  The frame was blue, the photo black and white.  It showed a hippy type with a little girl on her shoulders, both laughing, both in bell bottoms and peasant blouses, though the blouses had different embroideries and sleeve lengths, and the bellbottoms were different colours, so it wasn't like they were too matchy matchy.  The little girl had a little hat on, and her white blonde looking hair was in two braids, Viking style.  They both looked so happy.  I didn't realise Olga was behind me, looking over my shoulder, until she spoke:

"Is that you and Krista?"

I hadn't even considered that possibility yet until Olga, smart and perceptive as she was, pointed it out.  It totally was Molly and Krista!  I hadn't recognised them.  They looked so young, and I had never seen Krista look happy before.

"Yes," Molly smiled and nodded.  "On the Berkely campus - I taught courses at both Stanford and Berkely."

"Ooh, teaching both sides of the rivalry?  You rebel," I teased.  Molly laughed heartily.

"Her father took that."

I grabbed a can of soup out of the pantry - tomato - and waited for Olga to choose hers.  She chose clam chowder, and I offered to warm them both up on the stove while Olga sat with Molly.

"I have not heard about your husband yet," Olga was saying as I stirred the soup pots.  "Can you tell us about him?  Or is it not okay to ask?"

"Oh," Molly's voice faltered just a little.  I was looking at the soup but I was certain her smile had as well.  "There's not much to tell.  Jim was just a fellow hippie turned professor.  Unfortunately, he didn't make it through a certain disease…"

"Disease?!" Olga sounded alarmed.  "I am so sorry I had asked!"

"Oh, don't worry, it was about twenty five years ago.  I've had plenty of time to get over it."

I frowned at the soup, which was not quite at a boil yet.  I knew exactly which 'certain disease' had been sweeping the country a couple years before my birth.  Olga didn't need to hear the details of the old five and three pandemic, after all.

"Soup will be ready soon!" I said a bit loudly, hoping it would urge them to change the subject.  "Hope those bowls are nice and hollowed out!"

"So you eat the bowls?" Olga either took my bait or took the hint.

As Molly was explaining the concept of bread bowls and San Francisco's famous sourdough to Olga, I finished the soup and brought over the pots, which Molly told me to just throw in the sink unwashed after pouring the soups into our bread bowls.  I gratefully took a seat by Olga, who was sitting across from Molly, and began to eat.  There is something about fresh San Francisco sourdough that makes anything, even canned tomato soup, taste like ambrosia, like mana from imaginary heaven.  Even Olga was smiling that lovely smile of hers, that one that warmed my heart like this soup was warming my stomach.

"It is quite good to eat the bowls!" She gushed happily.

"You could say," I couldn't resist piping in, quarking an eyebrow, "that it is… quite cold."

Olga turned to me, looking just a tad confused.  "But you told me you do not say things are col- Oh, I see.  You are teasing me." She smirked.  "That is terribly wicked of you to tease me so, Moira."

Molly laughed and shook her head a little. "Oh, you girls!  Conversations like this keep me young!  Oh, if only you had been born fifty or sixty years earlier."

"Olga kinda was," I pointed out.

Olga had to swallow a bit of soup first, nodding, before replying, "Oh, much earlier than that!"

"Though," I pointed out my hairstyle (which was modeled on that of a twenties flapper) and vintage clothes (even if they were from Goodwill), "I do have somewhat of an affinity for vintage aesthetics, just not the racist, sexist, homophobic social views of the time."  Okay, so maybe Kearny had rubbed off on me in all the years we had roomed together at school.  For how much I teased my women's studies minoring friend, I recognised that it wasn't a bad thing for her enlightened views on social justice to be rubbing off on me.  And they seemed lately to be rubbing off on Olga too, which was excellent news, as many of the values of Tsarist Russia had really no place in modern day San Francisco.

"Then you would really love Lindy in the Park," Molly smiled at me, her skin crinkling around her eyes.

I'd vaguely heard the term "Lindy in the Park" before from my coworkers - from what I gleaned, some sort of rockabilly slash neo swing event in Golden Gate Park?  Or something?

"Oh, I probably couldn't afford it anyway," I shrugged.  "Besides, some of those rockabilly clothes… well I've been in the shops in the Haight, they're not cheap."

Olga, as she had learned to do when she didn't understand what was being talked about, sat back and observed quietly, taking it all in.

"Oh, stuff and nonsense!" Molly waved her licked clean spoon at me.  "It doesn't cost a damn thing - I go whenever I can!  And if you're really so concerned, I still have much of my clothes from growing up in the fifties.  I'm not getting any younger, girls, you could take your pick of dresses!"

"Uh…" Olga began.

"Oh," I began to explain, "it's like a jazzy thing in Golden Gate Park, the park near school-"

"It's a free event where anyone can come to dance or just listen to some good old swinging music," Molly cut me off.

"I confess to not being fond of much of the music I have had the chance to hear here," Olga replied.

"It's not like what you're thinking," I cut in.  "It's… well, some of the music dates back to just after your time, to the twenties, and goes up into the fifties.  Jazz music is really just a successor to ragtime, with a bit more African rhythmic influence."  I paused.  "I mean… if it's free than I guess it's worth checking out… I can't dance that well though, and I definitely don't know how to lindy hop."

"They offer free lessons at noon, an hour before the event starts," Molly clarified.  "Of course, I just like to go to listen to the music of my youth.  It's not easy getting old, girls.  I definitely don't recommend it."

"When is it?" Olga asked.  Oh, god, she wanted to go, didn't she?  If she wanted to go, I had to make that happen for her.  I had to.  

"Oh, I'll be going Sunday," Molly said.

And then I remembered the entire reason I'd wanted to visit her.

"Sunday?  We can't on Sunday!" I exclaimed.  "I mean, ah, we'd already made plans to go down to San Jose on Sunday, for research purposes.  To find out more about the amulet and all that."

"That's okay, it happens every Sunday after all," Molly wasn't phased.  

"Actually…" I stood up and went to grab my bag where I'd set it down.  "That's kind of partially why I came here tonight.  I wanted to ask you about something."

"Oh?  And what is that?" Molly asked.  I produced from my bag the photo album she'd let me borrow.

"My friend Kearny noticed a dark mass in some of these photos."  I frowned.  Molly's expression faltered again when I pointed the shadow out, and my frown deepened.  "Her boyfriend mentioned something about shadow ghosts or something, and I also saw it in photos from the museum from the day, um…" I turned to Olga.  "The day I found you."

At first, our old lady friend didn't reply.  Olga's eyes had locked with mine and I got lost in them for a second, but even when my attention turned back to Molly she was still silent.

"Er, Molly?" Olga asked cautiously, and the old woman shook her head.

"I was afraid you would find out about It."  The way she said "It" made "It" sound very important.

"So there is someone there…?" I prodded.

"Not someone.  Something," she corrected.  "No one is sure what It is, only that It has been after the centre stone of the amulet for millennia.  It's been sighted in Egypt, Greece, Turkey, Germany, Russia… and now San Francisco.  My father called It 'The Entity'."

"The Entity?" Olga repeated.

"Well that sounds ominous," I muttered.

"I dare not tell you girls more - I was never brave enough to research more about It, and I advise that you don't either.""What?  Why not?"

"Because," Molly's vocal tone became suddenly serious.  "When you start paying attention to The Entity, It starts paying attention to you."


	13. Fear and Loathing in San Jose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A lot happens in this chapter, both with the Entity subplot and the romance subplot. So... have fun with that, kiddos.

_"In a way, California has turned its back on the world, and looks into the void Pacific.  It's sort of crazy sensible." ~ D. H. Lawrence_

 

So much for trying to save money!  I had long known that relationships were expensive, but I could hardly call Olga my girlfriend just yet.  As much as I hated the fact, she wasn't my girlfriend, just an accidental roommate turned friend.  And for that, I knew I should have been thankful.  And very well, so I was.  Regardless, I realised Sunday would be another splurge day.  At least I had just gotten another paycheck…

I would have to buy MUNI passes and CalTrain tickets. (Skyler was going to pick us up from the CalTrain station in downtown San Jose and drive us to the Rosicrucian from there, so at least it was one less bus to pay for.)  I would have to buy breakfast and lunch. All this not just for me, but for Olga as well.  I didn't blame her, of course.  How could I?  It was my own damn fault after all.  Not that I was complaining.  My usually frugal spending habits aside, I really did like having her around.

But as long as I was splurging anyway…

Rather than get the coffee at the school's cafe, since the quality there tended to vary a little, I decided to get us breakfast near the CalTrain station.  We took the seventy one bus from the Haight Ashbury (which isn't too far a walk from campus, though I rarely went over there even so.) and then transferred to the forty five bus to get to the CalTrain Station on fourth street.  Even though I would be spending forty plus dollars on our round trip tickets to San Jose, from the bus stop we crossed the street.  It was then that Olga seemed to realize we were not getting on the train right away.

"I thought we were going to eat breakfast on the train.  Moira, where are we going?"

It had occurred to me when I had mentioned taking the train to her, that Olga was picturing a steam engine train like the type she would have known back in 1910s Russia.  I flashed a smile at her.

"Trains like this one don't really serve food - I think AmTrak might if you were going up to Washington, but San Jo is like only an hour and a half away by train.  Come on."

Not too far up fourth street - the CalTrain station was still in view - we stopped into a cafe called The Creamery, which always had rave reviews in papers and online, and was thus always pretty packed, even on a Sunday morning.  I lead Olga inside to order.  She had taken quite a liking to coffee after all (I wasn't quite sure if she would have liked it anyway or if it was due to how I had resurrected her, but either way I didn't mind so much.), and I thought she would like the coffee this place used.  I had only been here once before, with Skyler when we had toured the USF campus as high school seniors, but I remembered the coffee being top notch.  Judging by the mix of hipsters, businesspeople, and tourists, my memory was not wrong.  To The Creamery's credit, the line moved fairly fast, and we were at the front before we knew it.

"Hi," I told the friendly looking guy behind the counter.  "I'm going to have a mocha - can you make that with soy milk?  Thanks - and a yogurt and granola, no bananas."

"Are the strawberries still fine?" he asked me.

"Yeah, strawberries are fine.  Can you add blueberries to it?"

He nodded.  "Whipped cream on your mocha, ma'am?"

I shook my head with a smile.  "No thank you.  Oh, and whatever she wants," I gestured to Olga, who was still reading the menu with concentration.

"Moira," Olga tugged my sleeve, "I still do not know the difference between a cappuccino and a latte."

"Uh…" I started, but counter boy helpfully piped in:

"A cappuccino has more steamed milk, and thus more foam, roughly half of the drink.  A latte has less foam.  It's the same amount of coffee either way."

"Ah," She nodded.  "Then I shall have a latte."

"You want soy milk as well?"

"No, thank you," she shook her head, and turned back to me.  "My French is rusty, but a crepe is like a blin, yes?"

That one I did know.  "Yeah, they're pretty similar, both are like super thin pancakes."

"Good.  Then I will have this eggs florentine crepe?"

"You got it!" Counter boy nodded.  "Will that be all?"

"Yeah, thank you so much!" I smiled.  

He gave me my total, I paid, we waited and got our food, and then chose to sit outside in the courtyard area.  It was a really nice day today, but I knew that meant that it would probably be pretty hot in San Jose, as it pretty much always was in May.  I had elected for black leggings, an oversized off white button up shirt belted in the middle, and a vintage floral vest from the seventies, with yellow ballet flats (to match some of the flowers in the vest pattern) and a black newsboy cap.  Olga was in a vintage blue floral Laura Ashley dress that I rarely wore, but she had taken quite a liking to.  Despite Kearny and I both trying to warn her that her feet would be sweating, she insisted upon wearing white stockings (she always wore stockings - a relic of her past, I suppose, when all women wore them) and her only shoes, the black flats.  We weren't exactly fashionable but it didn't matter.  Today wasn't for looking good, it was for research, and thus it was important that we be comfortable.  And thus we were.

"That looks good," I gestured to her crepe, which had eggs, spinach, caramelized onions, mushrooms, and hollandaise sauce in it.

"It is very good.  Do you want to try some?" She smiled at me.

I did, but I shook my head.  "Oh, no, I couldn't possibly…"

"Nonsense.  Moira, I know you do want to try some.  Here, you take a bite of mine and I shall take a bite of yours."

"Can't argue with that," I shrugged.  We did so.  Hers was absolutely delicious, but I probably couldn't have eaten a whole one.  She evidently felt the same about mine:

"It is good, but it is very sweet for so early in the day."

I laughed and nodded.  "Yeah, I've always had a bit of a sweet tooth in the mornings.  How's your coffee?  And no, I don't want to try that one as well, I just want to make sure you're enjoying it…"

"I am," She beamed at me in that special way of hers that always made my chest feel like it was about to burst.  "It is lovely to eat outside in the sunshine like this.  Thank you for paying it for me."

"You're welcome!" I beamed back.

"And," she continued, after having chewed and swallowed a bite - Olga, unlike the unrefined Kearny and Raffi and me (but not Summer), never talked with her mouth full - "I am looking forward to seeing your home city."

"San Jose is actually bigger than San Francisco, though it's mostly suburbs," I replied, "so it's not likely you're going to see the part I'm from.  Though, I did go to the museum we're going to more than once as a child, usually for like school trips and stuff."

"Oh?" She asked.

"Yeah, but we're going to the library part, not the museum part.  I mean, like, unless you and Skyler decide you want to go."

Olga shrugged, took another bite, chewed, swallowed, and took a sip of her coffee.  "I think it would be interesting, but I am okay if we do not go as well.  I think it depends on how much time we have after getting the information we need.  I'll just be interested to see a new place.  And to go by train - I must confess that though I never much minded automobiles, the overabundance of them here did surprise me at first, and I'm relieved that people still travel by train."

"We're only gonna be gone a day.  It's not worth getting Betty Lou out for that."

"Betty Lou?" 

"Uh, that's what I named my car."  I blushed.  "Kinda silly, huh?"

"Yes," Olga did not hesitate.  "But I don't mind.  It is… a very Moira thing to do."  She said that with a smile, and my blush deepened.

"You- You think so?"

"I do," she nodded.

We ate more in silence for a few minutes, and then Olga spoke again:

"Will I be meeting your mother?"

"Oh.  Uh, no.  Definitely not.  I didn't tell her I was coming down."

"Why not?"

"It's, uh… it's complicated…" I didn't want to tell Olga that I hadn't told my mom of her existence.  I wasn't sure that it would offend her, but just in case I didn't want to tell her.  Luckily, she seemed to accept my explanation, weak as it had been.  And thus, we finished our breakfast and made our way back to the CalTrain terminal.

Olga looked around the train station with interest, though I was certain she'd like the San Jose one better, as it was less modern and urban looking, and more a Art Deco nineteen thirties kind of thing.  (Okay, so I might have been pretty fond of the San Jose CalTrain station too.)  I had seen it all before, and had to grab the poor dear by the arm and gently - gently - pull her towards where I was purchasing the tickets.  There went forty more dollars… I put both of our tickets in my wallet so we wouldn't lose them.  It wasn't that I didn't trust Olga not to lose them or anything - I knew of course that she was more than capable of holding on to things.  It was more that neither of us had pockets, and she didn't have a purse or a bra to put her ticket in.  (Kearny and I still hadn't figured out how to get her fitted for one without embarrassing her - she still blushed when we said "shit" after all.  So Olga mostly went commando, a fact I always had to try very hard to not think too much about!)  I had brought a purse, though, as well as a school notebook that I was willing to sacrifice pages for notes on this damned mysterious amulet and, despite Molly Henderson's warning, on The Entity too if we could find any.  (I'd also brought some pens.)

It wasn't long until it was time to board a train.  We sat on the second level of the two level train, across from one another.  The train, of course, didn't embark right away.  Even once it did start, Olga didn't say anything, just stared serenely out the window and watched the passing scenery.  I couldn't help but wonder what, exactly, she was thinking about.  I didn't say anything until the Millbrae station.

"What are you thinking about?"

I felt a little bad, because I must have surprised her.  She jumped a little, then turned to me, grey blue eyes slightly widened.

"Oh," Olga tucked a small piece of hair that had fallen out of her usual simple bun thing behind her ear.  "Oh, nothing.  Well, nothing really.  I was just… admiring the scenery."

Some things never changed.  I knew that tone of voice.  I'd heard it many times.  From Skyler, from Kearny, from Summer… even from myself.

"Alright," I said.  "Spill it."

"What?"

"Uh… figure of speech, sorry.  I meant I know you're thinking something, so you might as well just tell me what it is."

She gave a small, serene little closed mouthed smile, and shook her head.  "I was just watching the scenery as we pass it and thinking… so much has changed since I last walked this earth.  But so much has stayed the same, too."

"Hm?  What do you mean?"

"Well, what I mean is… obviously things have changed, yes?  I always figured that automobiles and electricity would someday become a lot more commonplace, for they are convenient, and I was correct.  But… look," she gestured just as we passed a man catching a dog that had gotten off its leash and handing it back to its owner.  "People… people are still very much the same.  There are nicer ones and there are meaner ones, but I think that, inside, everyone is fundamentally good.  I don't think babies are born evil, something had to make them that way.  Even the men who killed my family, and even that Hitler man you and Kearny had me read so much about when I brought up Jews."

I must have looked a little awestruck - I certainly felt it - because she suddenly blushed and looked away, sheepishly.

"It… is not such a weird thing to think about, is it?" she asked with a slightly embarrassed tone.

"N- No, not weird at all.  Just… surprising.  You were thinking all that?"

"Well, not at first," she confessed.  "At first I was just marveling at how different every building is that we have passed.  But… trains have always done this to me.  If I am not reading on one, my thoughts begin to move as fast as the train does."

I couldn't help but smile, and reach across the little table thing to lightly give her arm a playful little punch - more a tap than a punch, really.

"You, Olga Nikolaevna, are incredible, do you know that?"

"Thank you.  So are you."

It was my turn to blush.  "Me?  No I'm not."

"You are," she nodded.  "If nothing else, you prove my theory that people are fundamentally good.  I was totally at your mercy when I woke up from the great sleep that is death, and you have done all in your power to make me comfortable while gently urging me to adapt."

I had to look down.  My hands, wringing against one another, were suddenly so interesting.  I watched the nervous movement of my own fingers as I replied, "Aw, it's kinda what anyone would have done."

"Not really, no.  Moira, I believe your greatest trait is your compassion.  I have seen it in the way you treat me, in the way you stop to help animals, in the way you gave that little crying boy some quarters at the Musée Mécanique, in the way you will not start eating until everyone else does… Kearny is not correct in calling you a mouse, for mice are selfish beasts, and you, Moira… you are not.  Not at all.  It's admirable, really."

I didn't know what to say.  I don't know how long I looked down at my own hands, blushing, before I finally came out with, "Is that really… I mean, you really think so highly of me?"  Oh gross, my voice came out all tiny and embarrassed sounding too.  But I was, of course, in awe.  I had been so unbelievably awestruck to meet a real live royal, a Romanov no less, and to think, this whole time, she had been thinking highly of little old me as well?  Moira Angela Callahan, who was not royal or rich or even terribly interesting, little mousy Moira who let people walk all over her just to avoid conflict?  Dorky Moira, who listened to music older than her and cried over "Doctor Who" episodes and acted like a total coffee snob even though she couldn't really afford to be picky?  An incredible girl like Olga thought highly of _that_?!

"I do.  Of course I do," Olga nodded, snapping me out of my own train of thought.  I was beginning to see what she had meant about trains making one think.  "You know, you're more incredible than you think you are."

I hadn't thought it would be possible to blush any more than I already was, but apparently I was wrong.  All I could choke out was, "Uh… so are you."

Olga paused, then laughed a little, as did I once she began with her cute little giggles. 

"Well, thank you, Moira."

"No.  Thank you."

There was a pause, and then we both started laughing again.  It suddenly occurred to me how absolutely normal this scene was.  We were just two normal girls, two friends, giggling at each other on a train.  And it was then I realized that, somewhere along the line, I had stopped seeing Olga as some sort of creature of awe.  She was no longer Olga the grand duchess, to be put upon a pedestal and admired like a piece of art, pretty as she was.  No, somehow, somewhere, I had stopped seeing her as that untouchable being and started seeing her as Olga the human, Olga my friend.  And I liked that so much better.

The rest of the ride passed rather uneventfully - in between periods of silence, we made small talk about San Jose and about the books she had been reading and stuff.  I told her a little bit about Rosicrucian Park and the Rosicrucian society that ran it. (they weren't quite a cult, not like the overly smiley but ultimately harmless folks who ran a vegan restaurant near downtown and worshipped a little old Asian lady named  "Master Ching Hai" .  The Rosicrucians were more like a secret society, like the Freemasons, except that if you had enough money they would totally give you all their secrets.  So… like the Freemasons.)  I told her a little bit about Skyler and how we had become friends.  (We were in the same class in the fourth grade.  We got seated next to one another, I let her borrow a Goosebumps book for the whole Sustained Silent Reading thing that schools were so big on in the nineties.  Skyler, ever outgoing, decided right away that this made us best friends.  We had been best friends ever since.) Soon we were at the last stop of the ride, San Jose's Caltrain station.

The San Jose CalTrain station is a pretty brick building that would look more at home on the East Coast than in earthquake prone California.  It's pretty much a no-frills transit hub, less confusing than the San Francisco station.  There's the boarding area for CalTrain, AmTrak, and San Jose's own lightrail train system.  Then inside the 30's-esque (Though I don't think it was even around back then, that's what the architectural style always reminded me of) brick building itself, there's a small waiting area and a small concession stand selling sodas and energy bars and candy and trail mix and post cards, with restrooms near the back of the building.

Out front, in the drop off and pick up area, Skyler's car was waiting.  It was a red Toyota Prius, paid for in full by her outrageously rich stepdad.  (He and her mom were total opposites but totally in love, it was kind of awesome.  And kind of disgusting, in that adorably gross way that happy couples often are.  I wanted to be that gross with Olga.  Was it ever to be?)

I gallantly opened the door to the backseat, let Olga get in first, then slid in next to her.  Skyler commented on this from the driver's seat:

"Oh, come on, one of you get up here!  I feel like your chauffeur!"

"You don't mind, do you?" I shot Olga an apologetic smile, and she gestured to the front seat as if to tell me 'No, by all means, go on!'  I did, go on, climbing over into the front seat.

"So," Skyler adjusted her rear view mirror, "this is the infamous Olga!"  I had been updating Skyler via text message all about Olga.  Her mother was a real new age nut - in fact her job was something involving some new age practise called "reiki", and she also read tarot cards - so Skyler wasn't too phased by Olga's origins.

"It is very good to meet you," Olga replied formally.  "Do I call you Miss MacIntyre or…?"

"Ew, no.  God, no.  Just Skyler is fine," she shook her head and started the Prius.  Skyler was wearing a white tee shirt with quarter length sleeves and thin navy blue stripes on it.  With this, denim cut off mini shorts and cowboy boots that I recognized from when she had gotten them in high school at the Berryessa flea market.  No jewelry, light blonde hair tied back in a fishtail braid.  That was typical Skyler, there was no fuss with her, not ever.

"Thanks again for picking us up and, like, helping with today and all," I told my best friend.  

She nodded, "Not a problem.  I like the Rosicrucian park.  Hey, if we have time I totally wanna check out the museum though!  You interested?"  This last question was directed at Olga, who said:

"Hm?  Me?  It is just Egyptian things, yes?"  I realized suddenly that Olga had just barely missed the Egyptomania of the Roaring Twenties.  "If we have time, I suppose it would be interesting.  I would certainly not mind, if it's something you and Moira are interested in."

"Awesome possum," Skyler nodded.  "Let's get some tunes in this bee - yatch!"  Skyler listened mostly to indie stuff - Kimya Dawson, The Decemberists, stuff like that - as well as grunge and the occasional classic rock.  Right now, the CD that played was Hole, the song was "Doll Parts".  I opened my mouth to comment on it, but she shushed me.  "Ah ah ah, Moira!  You know the number one rule of the road, don't you?"

I sighed and nodded.

"What is this rule?" Olga piped up from the backseat.

Skyler smirked.  "Driver picks the music, passengers shut their cakeholes."

"Fair enough," Olga sat back and continued to watch the scenery as Skyler and I gabbed and chit chatted about this and that.  

It was only a short drive up highway 87 to get to the museum.  As Skyler parked in one of the two parking lots I went over the list of topics to research: Anything about any strange amulets.  Necromancy.  Carnelian.  Magic in Ancient Egypt, Byzantium, and Russia.  The Entity and anything that sounded like It, even if only vaguely.  

The Rosicrucian Park, taking up a full city block in one of San Jose's many many suburbs, was an odd place, though a very calm serene one.  It was almost as if once one was on the grounds, among the sphinxes and obelisks, the museum and research library and planetarium and temple and Egyptian style "peace garden", modern San Jose itself suddenly felt out of place.  All the buildings (except for the domed planetarium, which presented the Rosicrucian's vision of the universe and future, and was built in an architectural style bringing to mind the Muslim Moors of medieval Spain) were designed to look like Ancient Egyptian ones, and the park's fountains and walkways and statues and even plants all were designed to look as close to Ancient Egypt as one could possibly get in California.

I'd always liked it here.  It was an interesting and peaceful place.

I watched Olga's eyes light up as she took it all in as we were walking to the research library.  I was vaguely aware of Skyler elbowing me in the side and whispering into my ear:

"Buddha's Balls!  You're really head over heels for this chick, aren't you?"

I was.  But that was not why we were here.

We settled down into the library, secured a table, and began pulling books from the shelves (one at a time, so each of us claimed one third of the library and had to ourselves remember what part of the shelf we had left off on) and scouring through them for any information that might have been even the teensiest bit relevant in any way whatsoever.  We had to be thorough, but at the same time we had to be quick enough that we could look through more than just the one book.  Olga was pretty useful in that many of the books in the library were untranslated French, and there were even a few Russian ones.

Now, I'm not going to repeat every one of the notes we took here.  It would take too long, many were nonsensical, and some of Olga's were in French.  All I can say is that the most interesting thing we found that morning was something Skyler found in a book that was older than Olga.  (In that it was published in the 1870s.  Olga, of course, counted herself as being twenty two, which was actually a year younger than I was.  In November, a couple months after my September birthday, she would finally get her twenty third birthday that the Bolsheviks had robbed her of.)

What Skyler found in that old, musty tome were reproductions of old German woodcuts, labeled "Der Großmann".  Olga helpfully informed us that although her German had never been terribly great in the first place and it was awfully rusty now, she was fairly sure that "Der Großmann" meant "The Tall Man".  Well, the woodcuts certainly didn't look like any man I had ever seen, tall or otherwise.  They showed a dark, skeletal, almost reaper-like figure with extra arms, thin and spider-like, doing horrid horrid things to its victims.  The text described how Der Großmann would take its victims away, never to be seen again, though occasionally their organs would be found up in the trees.  Before they were taken, for weeks or even months, the chosen victims would act possessed, but no acts by any priests, Protestant or Catholic, could help.  The description also "helpfully" told us that no human words in any language could adequately describe the full scope of this terrible being.

Was this The Entity?  

I could see why The Entity was so feared.  It could not be understood, and people fear most what they cannot understand.  I was determined to understand.

We had to go deeper.

Also from Germany, we found a description of the famous painting by German renaissance painter Hans Baldung.  His most famous artwork was, of course, "Three Ages of Woman and Death".  Even I knew that, from my art history classes I'd taken as electives semi related to my major.  Apparently, in 2003, according to newspaper archives in the library, when undergoing X-Ray analysis for insurance reasons, it was discovered that the painting was altered early on - probably by Baldung himself - to remove extra limbs from the death figure.  A picture showed the X-Ray compared to the finish art work, showing a horrid resemblance both to Der Großmann and to the photos of The Entity with the black snakelike masses coming out of the main part of its dark body.  Arms?  Tentacles?! 

Olga shivered when Skyler showed us all of this.  Were she still religious, she may have crossed herself.  She whispered - for we had to be quiet in the library - "I do not like this… but…"

"But…?" Skyler and I whispered back, in unison.

Olga gulped, visibly, and my heart went out to the poor dear.  "Moira… this is all from the Renaissance… so… what year was the crusade against the Byzantines?  Before the Renaissance, yes?"

I nodded.  "It was the fourth crusade, I think.  That would have been… early 1200s I think?"

"So it is possible that the amulet was in Germany for the missing years?"

"Of course!" I gasped, a bit too loudly.  The librarian shushed us and Skyler waved an apology at her, while I looked sheepish but ultimately continued, quieter.  "Olga, you're a genius.  The amulet resurfaced in Russia when Catherine the Great showed up - and she was German!  No wonder the Germans have so much lore!  Oh, this makes it so much easier."  I closed what I was reading - something on a British psychopomp called the Ankou - and scribbled a note in my notebook.  From Egypt to Rome to the Byzantine Empire to Germany to Russia to America.  The amulet's path through history had been traced and it narrowed down our research immensely, which was great.

From Russia, we discovered an account from the early nineteenth century of a mother who was executed for the murder and disembowelment of her daughter Sorina.  The mother claimed she had done so under the instruction of a tall dark noble man, with multiple arms that were thin and long like snakes and sharp like swords.  She seemed possessed, but despite orthodox priests wishing to help her, she was hung.

Later, early twentieth century Russia, just before the Revolution?  Peasant folklore was documented about a "tall, dark, thin, and faceless man" who hunted down people for strange reasons - for instance, those born without a father, or those who masturbated while thinking about the royal family.  (Olga found this, and was really freaked out about that possibility.)

We were about to begin looking for anything we could find about Shadow People or about Ancient Egyptian magic when Skyler's stomach rumbled, and we realized we were all hungry.

"Want to break for lunch?" Skyler asked, and brandished a credit card under her stepfather's name.  "Seymour's paying!"

"Really?  He's cool with that?"

"Yeah, he said I could take it," she nodded.

We left the library drove right down the street to Zanotto's, an Italian grocery store with a deli in the back, and got sandwiches to go.  Then Skyler drove us to the city's rose garden, which was right down the street from the museum, where we could eat our lunch as a picnic.  (Skyler and I both had deluxe veggie sandwiches, hers on wheat and mine on rye.  Olga got prosciutto.)

The rose garden was really pretty this time of year.  Since it was mid May, many varieties were in bloom, and the air was sweet and fragrant with the scent of roses.  We sat in one corner of the garden, out of the way of the other people there, against the brick wall that surrounded the garden.  Olga sighed wistfully after taking only one bite of her sandwich.

"You alright there, princess?" Skyler asked, using "princess" not as a title but as a semi affectionate little nickname, the way Kearny sometimes called me "mouse".

"I was just thinking… Mama and Tatiana would have loved this garden.  They liked roses, though roses were always 'my' scent - Tatyushka's was jasmine."  She sighed again.  I reached out, not really knowing why I was doing what I was doing, and began to rub the shoulder closest to me, trying somehow to, I don't know, comfort her.  She shot me a small, saddish and yet grateful, smile.  "It's not that I don't like it here.  I just… for how much Mama and I sometimes argued - I was always closer to Papa, and Tatyushka to dear Mama - I did love her, you know?"

"I know," I nodded.  "I don't see eye to eye with my mother like ever, but, like, she's still my mom and I still love her to pieces."

"Yes," Olga nodded, and looked intently at her sandwich, suddenly leaning her head onto my shoulder.  She didn't see me blushing intensely at this, but Skyler did and had to bite her fist to avoid laughing at loud.  I glared at Skyler through my blush as Olga was saying, "I just miss them."

"You're allowed to miss them, you know," Skyler said.  I was suddenly very grateful she was here, for I wouldn't have known what to say, and that seemed to make Olga feel a little better, for the Russian girl nodded thoughtfully at that.

We finished our food and explored the Rose Garden a little more, then made our way back over to the Rosicrucian Park.  Not quite wanting to get back to research yet - Skyler claimed she needed to digest a little first, that "like swimming, you should wait a half hour after eating to study old occult shit!" - we walked around the grounds of the park, spending a little time in the peace garden, a garden made to look like a real Ancient Egyptian courtyard.  We also spent a little time at the giant Senet board.  Skyler taught Olga how to play and I watched them, amused, as they played a game, which Skyler let Olga win.

But we did have to get back to research, whether we liked it or not.  And so we made our way back to the research library.

I remembered that Raffi had made mention of something called a "shadow person" and began to look for mentions of that, while Olga investigated a possible link to the Ancient Egyptian mythological beast known as Apep, and Skyler sought out any other useful information she could find, reading on topics ranging from the Amarna period to the Knights Templar.  Around three o' clock, Skyler closed a book and turned to us.

"I can't take any more in.  My eyes keep reading the same thing over and over."

"Yeah…" I agreed.  "I'm kinda research overloaded, and I'm still going to have to work on research for homework assignments back up in the City tonight."

"I think we found much useful information," Olga offered.  Skyler and I agreed.

"Wanna stop?" Skyler asked.  "The museum is still open for another two hours.  I really wanna go.  I'll pay for you two and everything!  Well, Seymour will pay."

Olga and I agreed to this.  Thanking the librarian, we made our way over to the Egyptian Museum itself.

The museum housed four galleries, plus a very small gift shop.  The Daily Life and the Afterlife galleries were the best, with the small gallery dedicated to Akenaten - "the heretic pharaoh" - and the Amarna period was the least interesting to me.  (The Rosicrucians traced their society's lineage, rather dubiously, from Mr. Heretic Pharaoh, but he and his era of history had never interested me.)  Linking the Daily Life and Afterlife galleries was a replica of an Ancient Egyptian tomb that one could walk through after looking at some of the museum's mummies, including one of a priest that still had his tongue and fingernails, and one of a little girl from the Ptolemaic period.  Skyler had been to this museum so many times, that she kind of functioned like a tour guide for Olga and I.  It was nice to be on the receiving end of a museum tour for once.  At first I worried that the desiccated corpses might freak out Olga's Edwardian sensibilities, but she seemed to find them more interesting than creepy, reminding me that "You know, I was a nurse in the Great War.  I have seen far worse."  She was right, of course.  I kept forgetting that fact, and I knew that it was something I needed to keep in mind.  Olga was an extremely intelligent and capable adult woman - I didn't need to baby her.  

Even if she wasn't grossed out by the mummies, when we were in the tomb replica looking up at the image of the goddess Nut painted on the ceiling, she did confess to Skyler and I that she felt bad for the little girl mummy, and for the girl's parents.

"I know she lived centuries ago," Olga said, "but I remember seeing my Mama so worried over poor dear baby Alexei… can you imagine outliving your own child?  Losing a child so young?  The Egyptians lived so long ago, but they were humans, just like us.  They had their own hopes and their own dreams.  I wonder what that little girl's parents hoped for her, what hopes were taken when she died.  I wonder if they had any more children."

Skyler and I must both have been gaping at her, for Olga suddenly looked at us and blushed, and asked:

"…what?  What did I say?"

"Wow," Skyler breathed.

"What?  'Wow' to what?" Olga frowned.

"Wow," she repeated.  "Just wow.  You're incredible, you know that?  Moira, I can see why you like her."

Olga and I both blushed at that. 

We were silent for awhile, looking at all the paintings painted on the walls of the "tomb".  It was so weird down in this part of the museum.  It was almost as if we had been transported back in time to Ancient Egypt.  Being suddenly thrust into another time period… I shivered.  Is this what Olga felt like all the time?  I shot a look over to her, if only to see her looking at the part of the wall painting that showed Anubis weighing the heart on a scale against the feather of truth.

"Hey," Skyler turned to me.  "You guys wanna come to my place for dinner tonight?"

"Aw, Skyler," I sighed.  "It is two weeks till finals, I do have to get back tonight."

"Okay, fine, don't come over."

"Then again," I thought about it, "if we go on CalTrain now it'll be all stuffed up with commuter businessmen coming home from their work in google land…"

"I bet my mom would really like to see you," my blonde best friend grinned.

"What do you think?" I turned to Olga.

"Hm…" Olga began, but didn't decide for me.

"It's burrito night…" Skyler continued.  "Everyone likes burritos…"

***

We did end up going to Skyler's, if only because I didn't want to take Olga on a train full of businessmen.  And because dinner at Skyler's was bound to be interesting.  Her stepfather was a businessman of some sort; I had never been able to glean what exactly it was that Seymour Fitzwilliam did, but it was high paying enough that he could afford a large house in Willow Glen of all places, one of the most expensive neighbourhoods in the south bay area.  (The most expensive was Palo Alto, but they had married mine and Skyler's senior year of high school and wanted to stay close enough that she could graduate with the class she'd spent four years with.)  And because of the varied diets of everyone in the family, even something as deceptively simple as burrito night was bound to be interesting in some way.  

Skyler's mother, Marigold MacIntyre Fitzwilliam, was, as I said, a total new age type, who believed in stuff like crystal vibrations and astral travel, and was really interested in Eastern spirituality.  (Her birth name had been something like Mary or Margaret or something similar like that but she had changed it to Marigold.)  She was, as one would expect from someone like that, totally vegan.

The oldest kid in the family was actually twenty six, Patchouli MacIntyre.  He went by Patch most of the time, and still lived at home, along with his live in girlfriend, Janice Nguyen.  He worshipped jazz musician Jon Coltrane, gave sax lessons, and coached little league.  He and Janice were both ova lacto vegetarian, as well as on this whole gluten free thing.

Skyler's other older brother (older than her and I by like a year.  Not even a full year, either, he was older than Skyler by only like ten months.) was Jack MacIntyre, named after famed beat author Jack Kerouac of course.  He was a total omnivore.  

Skyler was a pescetarian, and was the last of the MacIntyre children, but not, by far, the youngest in the house.

Seymour had two kids from his first marriage, which had been with some blonde trophy wife type named Mitzi.  (From what I understood, she was a total ice queen - Seymour described marrying Marigold after Mitzi as being like moving from Alaska to Hawaii!)  There was seven year old Marcy, real cute kid but kind of a know it all, did spelling bees.  Then there was four year old Alfie, who was really quiet and shy - Marcy did all the talking for both of them.  Of course both kids were also omnivores, although Marcy did have a tree nut allergy.

And then, last of all (not counting the three dogs - Stella, Luna, and Sol.), was the little Chinese baby girl Seymour and Marigold had adopted together, two year old Wren Fitzwilliam.

Burrito night at my family would have meant refried beans, store bought pico de gallo, stale tortillas, and plasticy cheese.  At Skyler's place?  Roasted edamame, red quinoa, all natural organic tortillas in both wheat _and_ corn varieties, fresh avocado marinated in olive oil with cilantro, all sorts of vegetables from the farmer's market (some of which I had never even heard of), lobster with lemons, three varieties of grated imported cheese, and wild caught pan seared Alaskan salmon.

"Edamame," Marcy was saying as we stepped in and Janice was helping her spoon some into a corn tortilla.  "E - D - A - M - A - M - E.  Edamame."

"Somehow I don't think you'll be getting the word 'edamame' at a Bee, Marcy," Patch ruffled her hair.  The seven year old looked a little annoyed at that action and begin trying to fix her pigtails, saying:

"If it's in the dictionary it can be included in a spelling bee."

"Twerking is in the dictionary now you know," Jack pointed out.  "Spell that one, Marc'."

"Twerking.  T - W - I -"

"EEENNGH," Jack cut her off with a fake buzzer noise, to let the poor little seven year old know she'd spelled it wrong.  

"Jack," Marigold began with a warning tone, when she noticed Skyler walking in with us.

"Hey mom," Skyler waved, pulling up two extra chairs for Olga and I.  "Sorry we're late.  Rush hour traffic, you know how it is."

"Moira!" Marigold's face lit up when she saw me.  "It's always good to see you, honey!" Her eyes lit upon Olga.  "Oh?  And who is this?"

"Introduce yourself," I whispered to Olga with a smile.

"I am Olga Nikolaevna," Olga responded, taking the seat Skyler offered her.

Jack gave her a grin and began to put together a plate for her, but I glared at him, something I was only comfortable doing because I had known him for so long at this point, that he was practically like a brother to me.  He handed me the plate instead - so far, it was just a wheat tortilla with edamame and quinoa.  I added avocado and grated parmesan cheese to it myself.

"Olga.  What a lovely name," Marigold commented.

"Thank you," Olga answered.

"You're Russian?" Janice asked.  When Olga nodded, she held out her fist for a fist bump.  "Alright!  Immigrant pride, yo!"

Olga merely looked at Janice's fist with confusion, so Janice shrugged and gave the fist bump to little Wren instead.

"She, uh…" I began, not sure how to finish that sentence.  "She just moved to San Francisco."  It wasn't technically a lie, not really, but I wasn't really ready to tell Skyler's whole family about Olga's origins.  Also, I don't think she would have been that comfortable with it.

"Really?  Your English is quite good," Seymour complimented her, his teeth and bald spot both glimmering.

"Thank you.  I have been learning it since I was a small child," she answered.  "And I like San Francisco very much," this was directed towards me with a small little grin that made me blush and suddenly look down very hard at my burrito.

The rest of the dinner passed rather uneventfully, or at least what passed for uneventful at the MacIntyre Fitzwilliam place.  Patch talked about the little league team he coached and how well they'd done last week's game, Skyler and I both bitched about upcoming finals, Jack shared some of his lame jokes (he wanted to be a stand up comic), Marcy attempted to spell out every difficult word someone said ("Revolution.  R - E - V - O - L - U - T - I - O - N.  Revolution."), and Olga graciously answered every question directed at her over the course of the evening.  

Dinner soon (well, soon enough) ended, and Patch and Janice offered to put Wren, Alfie, and Marcy to bed.  Jack and Skyler started clearing the table.  Skyler made Olga and I promise not to leave til she was done, which we agreed to readily.

"Moira," Marigold came and sat back at the table with us.  "How have you been, my dear?  You know, Skyler and I worry about you all the way up in San Francisco."

"It's not even an hour away," Skyler commented - the kitchen and dining room were connected so she could hear us.  "Mom exaggerates."

"Still," Marigold continued, running a hand through her short brown tousled curls.  "Moira, will you allow me to do a tarot reading on you?"

"Uh…" I trailed off, exchanging a glance with Olga, who just shrugged.  I didn't really believe in the tarot, but Marigold did with all her heart, and I didn't want to be rude to the woman who had been like a second mother to me since my elementary school days.  "I… guess…"

"Oh, excellent!" She clapped her hands together, excited like a small child.  "Let me go get my deck!  Olga, sweetie, do you want one too?"

"I would like to watch Moira's first, and then decide," Olga smiled sweetly.  How diplomatic of her.

Marigold came back with her deck, sat across from Olga and I, and held it out to me.  "I'll be doing a simple three card spread.  Go ahead, sweetie.  Pick three cards."

"Uh, okay…" I did so, placing them face down on the table.  Olga looked over, looking only semi interested.  I supposed she wouldn't be terribly interested in spiritualism or anything, what with her new lack of faith.

The first card she flipped over was The Empress.  Marigold smiled.  "Oh, this looks promising indeed."

"What?  What is it?" My curiosity got the best of me, whether I believed in the cards or not.  

"Well, sweetie, the Empress, like the planet Venus whose symbol adorns her," Marigold pointed at the image on the card, "rules love."  She shot a smile at Olga that Olga herself did not see, but I did.  I blushed.  Marigold evidently had caught on to my little crush.  Was I so obvious?  She continued, "The Empress card is a good omen, Moira my dear, but of course she doesn't mean that it'll come easy.  Anything worth having is worth working hard for, after all.  But The Empress?  She's telling you, Moira, to use your loving, caring ways that I know you have to accomplish your goals without losing your power.  Go ahead and throw your heart into it, but don't lose your head either, my dear girl.  Remember that above all, you are the best barometer of what is right for your romantic situation."

I blushed and shifted uncomfortably in my chair.  "Uh… next card?"

Marigold nodded, and flipped it.  Death.  I was surprised to hear Olga gasp at that.

"Oh, don't worry," Marigold assured her.  "The Death card is very misunderstood - it's not necessarily a negative omen at all, it's really a matter of perspective.  All this card is signifying is an intense change on the horizon, not necessarily a bad thing.  It could be connected to what I feel The Empress card was saying about your love life."

"Maybe it's cos she's looking for an apartment," Skyler piped up from the kitchen.  I shot a glare in her direction, hoping to convey to her not to encourage her mother any more than I already had by allowing this stupid reading, but she didn't see it.

"Ah, yes, that could be it too," Marigold nodded.  "Whatever this change ends up being, Moira, just remember to meet it head on.  Embrace it, and your worries will fade away."

I nodded.  Marigold flipped the third card, one I didn't recognise, and frowned.

"What is it?" I couldn't resist asking.

"Oh, it's… The Ten of Swords.  I was not expecting that one."

"What?  What's that mean?" I asked.  "Why isn't it a named one like the other two?"

"Oh, because this card is from the minor arcana, which has four suits: cups, wands, swords, and pentacles.  The swords represent the Air element, and thus the mind, the intellect, communication, and strife.  Unfortunately, as it's our thoughts and words that often get us into trouble, there are some more… discouraging cards.  But don't worry too much, of course."

I frowned at the image of the card, which had swords plunged into a corpse's back.  "I never knew the tarot could be so morbid."

"It could mean multiple things," Marigold said.  "Don't take the image literally, Moira.  At worst I think it could mean an upcoming struggle, with lots of sorrow… but the other two cards were positive, so you'll overcome it, I know it."

"Uh, thanks…" I nodded.

"Do you want a reading too, dear?" she turned to Olga.

Olga hesitated, then said, "do I have to have three cards?  Can I just pull one?"

"Of course, my dear."

Olga pulled out the Chariot, but it was upside down.

"Chariot reversed…" Marigold frowned.  

"What does that mean?" Olga asked.

"A creature of war and sorrow," Skyler piped up again, more nonchalantly than she should have sounded for what she was saying.

"Skyler!" Marigold scolded.  "Don't listen to her, Olga, sweetie, it could mean many things."

"Don't worry," Olga shook her head.  "I don't really believe in this stuff anyway."

"You should," Marigold sniffed.  "It believes in you."

***

"So how did you like Skyler and her family?  And San Jose?"  Olga and I were back on the train, heading back up to San Francisco.  This train didn't have the seats sitting across from one another, with the tables.  It just had normal seats, all facing forward.  So we were on the second level again, sitting next to one another.  I'd let her have the window seat though.

"It was… interesting.  Skyler's mother certainly is an interesting woman," Olga commented.

"Oh, don't mind her.  She's a kook, but she's a really nice lady."

"Oh, no, I could see that.  I've never understood tarot though, even in my old time."

I laughed.  "Don't worry.  I've known Skyler and her family since I was nine and I still don't really understand it.  That aside, though," I patted my bag, which had the notebook in it with all our notes from the museum, "I think we got some really good information today."

Olga nodded, but she looked a little distracted.

"What is it?" I asked.

"Nothing…" 

If I wasn't mistaken, Olga blushed a little when she said that.  I frowned.

"Olga, what is it?  Is something wrong?  Hey…"

"No, nothing is wrong," she smiled at me.  "I was just… thinking about something."

"Thinking about what?  Am I allowed to know?"

And then, suddenly, the strangest thing happened:

She was kissing me.

I didn't react at first.  I wasn't sure how to react.  My brain was spitting out thoughts faster than I could keep up with them.  Olga was, after all, technically born in the Victorian era, and back then kissing each other, even on the mouth, was just something friends did.  And then she slipped her tongue into my mouth - where on earth had she learned _that_?! - and I knew that this was definitely _not_ just something friends did.  My eyes slipped closed and my arms found their way around her shoulders, and I tried to not think about it too hard.

I'd always been the type of person who hated public displays of affection, who pushed Julia and other exes away when they so much tried to hold my hand in public.  I'd never been comfortable with couples going at each other right in front of me.  And yet, here I was, making out with Olga on a train.  I could taste the faint hint of lemon, perhaps from the fish she'd eaten at dinner.  Her lips and tongue, pressing against mine eagerly, were soft.  God, was this what I had been missing?  Had I known she was thinking this, could we have started doing this so much sooner?  I didn't know.  And at the time?  I didn't care.  

All that mattered was that she was kissing me and it was good.


	14. The Tide Is High

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Moira cannot bring herself to confront anyone, and Molly's words from earlier ring terrifyingly true - The Entity begins showing up more and more

_"I believe in everything until it is disproved.  So I believe in fairies, the myths, dragons.  It all exists, even if it's in your mind.  Who's to say that dreams and nightmares aren't as real as the here and now?" ~ John Lennon_

 

Incredibly, believe it or not, after that everything went back to normal.  It was as if Olga and I had a silent agreement not to bring up the kiss.  It was as if it had never even happened - and I was beginning to wonder if it even had.

Not that I had much time for wondering.  I didn't have time for anything but to cram for finals.  We didn't even end up going to the movies with Kearny and Raffi, I was too busy studying and working on my research papers.  And as if that weren't stressful enough, Kearny eventually wore me down and I agreed to that apartment, which, despite its unsavoury location, looked like it was the best we were going to get.  With the semester ending in less than two weeks, I had little choice - it was either the Tenderloin, or figure out how to get my mother (who still held out hope I might marry a nice man someday) to let Olga stay with us all summer.  Summer moved in, and Raffi and Kearny took turns spending nights with her.  In  theory I should have too, but we drew straws every few nights and I hadn't drawn the short one yet.  I guess I was just lucky.  Olga chose to remain with me, even if she had gone back to just treating me as Moira her friend.  It was an odd situation.  Even the nights Kearny was gone, we still shared a bed, and it was a lot harder sleeping next to her now that I knew what her lips felt like on mine.  I'm not going to lie, I was tempted to kiss her again.  But I didn't.  

What was stopping me?

Then again, what was stopping her?

I knew, of course, what was stopping me.  It was a problem I had always had - I didn't like confrontation.  I never had.  Maybe it made me a coward, but the possibility that maybe it had been a fluke, that bringing it up would somehow upset Olga… I couldn't bear it.  I couldn't bear to fight or argue with anyone, least of all a girl - no, a woman - as incredible as she was.  So… I suppressed my feelings.  I ignored it.  It was better than a potential argument.  Like an ostrich in a cartoon (because, did you know, they don't really do this in real life?) I buried my head in the sand and waited for the drama to pass.

***

Eventually - and, just my luck, the night before my first final, god dammit - I did draw the short straw to go stay overnight with Summer in our new apartment.  It wasn't exactly decorated yet.  Summer had moved some things in, but even the framed Asian art prints her parents had insisted on gifting her just rested against a wall in the kitchen, next to the refrigerator Raffi and his friends had taken up four flights of stairs just so we could have food.  (It was the refrigerator from Raffi's old bedroom at his parent's house.  I had no idea why they had let their son have a full sized fridge in his bedroom, but it was painted with chalkboard paint, which was pretty cool, so I didn't complain.)  There were no beds yet.  (Well, there were, but they were from a recent trip Raffi and Kearny and Summer had taken to IKEA, and so they were still in pieces in those flat boxes, sitting on the kitchen counter.)  Olga and I had gotten assigned the room at the end of the hall, next to Kearny and Raffi's room.  Summer got the room on the other side of the apartment, the one by the bathroom.  So of course, the apartment wasn't much yet.  Kearny and Raffi both had good eyes for art, even if neither of them were art majors, so after finals we all agreed we'd start making the apartment feel, well, more like a home and less like a storage unit with an admittedly pretty cool kitchen.  Olga and I were to sleep on a futon with some sleeping bags.

"Okay," I warned her on the MUNI streetcar over towards Union Square, "just so you know, the area of town this apartment is located in?  Kind of a piece of crap.  Just don't make eye contact with any hobos and stay near me okay?"

"Moira," Olga told me, "I have lived in San Francisco long enough now that I am not completely naive.  I think I will be okay."

I nodded.  "I know, I know.  I just… I get really nervous around that area, okay?  Last time I was there, a hobo flashed his dick at me, so yeah, I gotta warn you."

"I have seen a man's genital's before, you know."

"You have?" I frowned.  "When?"

"I was a nurse.  Remember?"

"Oh yeah, the nurse thing…" I blushed.  "Right."

Happily, we didn't come close to any hobos.  There were no working elevators in the apartment building, so we had to climb the stairs, but at least we didn't have to talk to any crazies.  (I feel bad for the homeless, I really do, but I've always been a bit irrationally phobic of them as well.  It's terrible, but there it is.)

"Hey!" Summer greeted us with a grin when we got in.  She was eating dim sum take out on the floor and watching "Taboo", that National Geographic show.  (Which was currently talking about, fascinatingly enough, polyamoury.)

"When did we get a T.V.?" I asked.  

"My dad brought it by today," she answered.  "It's actually not hooked up to any cable or anything yet.  This is a DVD.  Dim Sum?"

I took a seat and gestured for Olga to sit as well.  "Do you have those scallion pancake things?  I love those."

"Do I have scallion pancakes?" Summer scoffed.  "What do you think I am, a monster?  Of course I have scallion pancakes," she handed me some.  "Oh, but do you want me to turn the T.V. off so you can study?  You have a final tomorrow, don't you?"

"I have two out of four tomorrow.  But it's okay.  I'm ready for them.  Well, as ready as I'll ever be."

"This apartment… it has its own shower, yes?" Olga abruptly changed the subject when she had had her share of dim sum.  One thing she seemed to quite like about our modern era was showers.  I can't say I blamed her, really.  For how much I did love San Francisco, it certainly wasn't the cleanest of cities in America.  Even I knew that.

"Of course it does," Summer sniffed.  "Down the hall to the left, if you want to take one."

Smiling gratefully, Olga rose and took her leave of Summer and I to go shower.  I blushed and looked down when she smiled like that at us.  It was pretty hard to not focus on her rosy coloured mouth, all things considering.

No sooner had she left the living room did Summer turn to me and say in a deadpan tone of voice:

"Okay, Moira.  Something happened.  And you haven't told Kearny because she would have told me.  So what is it?  Spill."

"Oh, uh… It's… well… it's really nothing…"

"Moira Callahan you are the shittiest liar in this whole damn city.  Tell me what happened."

"Well, I mean, I know you don't really approve of… whatever kind of relationship it is Olga and I have," I began, not quite sure how I planned to end that sentence.

"I never said that," Summer cut me off.

"Yeah, but you think she's crazy."

"I never said that either."

"But you do."

"Moira, I know you're just trying to change the subject so you won't have to tell me what happened.  What is it, did you two fuck or something?"

"N- no!" I blushed.  "God, Summer!  No!  It's not… it's not like that, okay?"

Summer's voice softened, and she gave me this weird look that was a cross between amusement and pity.  "You want it to be, though.  Don't you?"

"Am I that obvious?"

"Kind of, yeah.  But she, at least, seems pretty oblivious to it."

"Not so oblivious," I sighed, picking at the dim sum that we were no longer eating but hadn't yet put away into that weird refrigerator from Raffi and friends.  "Like a week and a half ago or whatever, she uh… she kissed me."

"She kissed you?"

"Yeah…"

"Huh," Summer shrugged.  "I would never have guessed she'd make the first move.  Then again, I guess you wouldn't either."

"What's that supposed to mean?" I frowned.

"Oh come off it, Moira, we both know that you're not exactly the most take charge person around.  It's not a bad thing.  Don't look at me like that.  So what, are you two like girlfriends now?"

"I already told you it wasn't like that.  So no.  I don't know."

"You don't know?" she sounded incredulous.

"We kinda… haven't talked about it.  It's like the kiss never even happened."

"Except it did happen," Summer pointed out.  

"Yeah, I know.  Believe me.  I know."

"Moira, you need to talk to her about it."

"You said yourself that I'm not exactly a take charge kinda girl," I answered glumly.  "I can't.  What if it was a fluke?"

"Oh, right, because people just accidentally kiss people all the time," she rolled her eyes.  "What are you so afraid of?  Maybe she's just as scared as you are.  Which is totally stupid cos everyone can see you're nuts about her.  So yeah.  What are you afraid of?  Rejection?  She kissed you."

"And she hasn't done it again since.  I don't think-"

"Exactly," Summer rolled her eyes again.  "You don't think.  So don't think about it.  Just kiss her.  Tonight's the best time to do it, too, since you don't have Kearny in the room with you.  But if you're gonna have sex, do it quietly, cos the walls in this place aren't the thickest."

"Can we just change the subject before she finishes her shower?" I frowned again.  Fucking Summer.

"Fine," she shrugged.  "But just promise me one thing, Miss Callahan."

"And what would that be, Miss Wong?"

"That you'll get your head out of your ass eventually and talk to her!  You know it's the right thing to do!" she bopped the back of my head, not hard enough to really hurt or anything, but enough so that I knew it was serious.

"Yeah, yeah, I know," I rubbed my hair back down where she'd messed it up.  "I will… eventually."

***

Later that night, when Summer was in the shower, Olga and I were chilling on the living room floor.  I wasn't quite tired enough for bed yet, and thought maybe we could watch a DVD.  Had I known that Summer's parents had set up a TV and DVD player, I'd have brought one of mine from the dorm rooms, maybe "Good Bye Lenin!" or the first season of "Downton Abbey", both of which I thought maybe Olga would like.  As I did not know ahead of time that we would have this option, I was looking through the meager collection of DVDs already there.  Assorted K-Dramas, "Mean Girls", season three of "Scrubs", "Juno", "The Birds", and both versions of "Hairspray".  

"I don't want to watch any of these," I muttered under my breath.  "Hey, Olga, do you want to watch any of these?"  She didn't answer.  "Uh, Olga?" I looked up to face her, thinking perhaps she had brought a book or something and had gotten so lost in it that she maybe hadn't heard me ask.

No such luck.

Olga was, in fact, looking outside the glass door onto our balcony.  I noticed her face was not passive, not as if she had just happened to be looking in that direction and zoned out or anything like that.  No, her face was pale, her grey blue eyes were wide - she was petrified, terrified!  Why did she look like that?

I scooted over to her on my knees and said, quietly, "…Olga?  You okay?" I tried to put a hand on her shoulder and she jumped a little, and turned to face me.

"Moira," she smiled weakly.  But it was a fake smile, I could tell.  Her eyes were still fearful.  "I am sorry, I…" she trailed off, as if she didn't know how to finish that sentence.  I frowned.

"What is it?" I asked.

She hesitated, then gestured back to the balcony.  My eyes followed her gesture, and what I saw shocked me.

There, on the balcony, was a dark, vaguely human shaped mass, looking for all intents and purposes just like the shadowy figures in the photos.  It almost could have been a human shadow, except for three things:

One, it was tall, far too tall, and far too solid in its tallness.  This thing could have been seven or eight feet.

Two, the arms were far too many and far too thin.

And three?  This is the weirdest, most unexplainable thing of all, but it was as if the entire atmosphere changed when I set eyes on that figure.  It was too black, blacker than the blackest black that I had ever seen.  Goths would have killed to get their clothes this black, it was as if all light had been sucked into the blackness, never to return.  And that was terrifying, somehow.  I couldn't tear my eyes away, despite the cold, cold fear growing in me.

"Oh god, what is that thing?"

I realized nearly right away after I said it what it was.  Or rather, what It was.

The Entity.

"That's not… that's not possible…" I whispered.   But I realized then, as soon as I said _that_ , that it _was_ possible, terrifyingly so.  Molly's words echoed in my head over and over.  _"When you start paying attention to The Entity, It starts paying attention to you."_   I shivered.  Was this It paying attention to us?  How had It even found us? Well, okay, so maybe since It was a mythological creature or whatever, It could somehow hone in on our energies or something.  Still though, this was terrifying.  My thoughts were racing a mile a minute and I couldn't voice any of them, just sit there and stare like a terrified little deer.

I don't know how long Olga and I sat there, just staring at The Entity on our balcony.  At some time, I don't know when, one of us, I don't know who, had grabbed the other's hand.  We were gripping hands, white knuckled and sweating, and staring.  Just staring.

Why wasn't It _doing_ anything?!

I could feel beads of sweat running down my forehead.  My throat was suddenly very dry.  And was that my pulse or Olga's that I was hearing?

Ba - dum.

Ba - dum.

Ba - dum.

It turned its head.

Olga and I both jumped and clung onto each other, screaming at the top of our lungs.

"What?  What?!  What is it?!"

We turned around to see Summer, clad in only a towel, hair still wet and dripping on the floor.  Both Olga and I started blabbering all at once, and Summer was forced to finally yell out:

"Okay!  Okay!  Shut up, one at a time!" She pointed at me.  "Moira, what is it?  And say it calmly."

I nodded, and gulped.  Since I was nervous, my words spilled out overly quickly, but I managed to say, "Summer, there was- a thing, a thing on the balcony, and-!"

"There's nothing there," Summer frowned, looking at the balcony.

"Huh?" I turned.  She was right.  The balcony was completely empty.  "Where did it go?"

"There was something there, honest!" Olga insisted.

"It was probably a bird or something," Summer replied.

"It wasn't a bird, not at this time of night!" I argued.

"Okay, fine, but it doesn't matter.  There's nothing there," Summer said calmly.  "Okay?  See?  Nothing there.  I'm going to go get ready for bed, alright?  I suggest you two do the same."

Nodding numbly, I stood up on shaky legs, wiping my palms on the legs of my jeans and then holding a hand out to Olga to help her out.  "Come on, Olga."

She looked for just a second as if she wanted to argue, but ultimately she did no such thing.  Instead she stood as well and followed me down the hall to the barren little bedroom that would be ours once we moved in permanently.

"I don't know if I'm going to be able to sleep after that," I sat on the futon and crossed my arms over my chest, shivering a little.

Olga sat next to me, leaned her head on my shoulder.  "Yes… I know what you mean.  I am relieved that you saw it too, and I am not just crazy."

"You're not crazy," I told her.  "Your situation is pretty crazy.  But you're not.  You're…" I started to say "perfect," but stopped myself, lest Olga took it the wrong way.  Ultimately, I decided on, "you're sane.  Believe me.  It's just a fucked up situation."

She blushed, but nodded at my admittedly rather crude assessment.

"You should sleep, though," she said.  "You have a big test tomorrow, yes?  Or am I understanding it wrong?"

"No, you're totally right," I sighed.  "I just don't know how I'm going to be able to sleep.  Every time I so much as blink I see that - that _thing_ again, in my mind's eye."

She stood up as I lay back on the futon, staring up at the ceiling.  Olga was weirdly shy about a lot of things, but she no longer seemed to mind changing into her pajamas - which still consisted of the oversize long tee shirt I had given her on her first day being back alive again - in front of me.  I could never decide if this was a good thing or a bad thing.  Did it mean she saw me as more of a sister?  (She certainly hadn't kissed me in the same way I pictured her kissing Tatiana or Maria or Anastasia!)  At any rate, I had to focus very intently at the ceiling.  I knew that if I happened to glance over, I might end up staring.

"Just don't think about it," Olga suddenly said.

"H- huh?" I felt my face growing hot.  How had she known how hard I was trying to concentrate on not staring at her and thinking about how soft her lips felt and how good her tongue tasted?

"The Entity," she answered.

"What?"

"The Entity," she repeated, sitting on the futon by my legs.  "Molly Henderson said that if you think about It then It will think about you.  So we should try to think about something else."

"Oh.  That.  Right," I nodded, blushing.  Of course.  Now that she had told me not to think about It, though, I couldn't help but go back to thinking about It.  "That's easier said than done, though, Olga.  And you know it."

"I know," she lay next to me, and I scooted over to accommodate her on the futon.  It was really quite small, as it was only made for one person.  This forced her to kind of cuddle up next to me, leaning her head into my shoulder again.  I had to adjust where that arm was and we ended up with her head on my chest and me petting her hair - I guessed I would just sleep in my jeans that night.  Not that I was complaining.  "I know it is," Olga was saying.  "I know."

"You keep saying you know, you know?"

"Do you want me to sing to take your mind off of It?  To take both of our minds off of It?  Mama and us girls used to sing to Baby when he was in pain, you know, to take his mind off of the pain of his affliction."

"Yeah?  I'm not exactly a hemophiliac tzarevich."

"No.  I suppose you're not," she sighed.  "It might help you fall asleep though."

"I can't sleep with music.  Never could.  But tell you what.  If you think it'll calm us down, or even if it'll just calm you down, then go for it.  It certainly can't hurt, right?"

I felt her nod.

We were silent for a few minutes before she began to sing.  It was in Russian, so I couldn't understand a word of it.  But it was a lovely little song, soft and slow and sweet and just a little bit sad too.  Olga had a sweet, feminine voice, and was certainly a fair enough singer, better than me at any rate.  Even if it didn't make me sleepy, the Russian lullaby had a somewhat calming effect on both of us, and The Entity left my mind.

Leaving the other doubt that had been nagging me to enter in It's place.

I knew what Summer had said earlier was right.  I had to talk to Olga about the kiss.  Tonight would be a good night to do it too.  She was already cuddled up next to me.  All I had to do was say the words.  Five little words: why did you kiss me?  All five of them were only one syllable too.  So it would be easy enough to say it, in theory.

I just… couldn't bring myself to do it.  Not yet.

***

My first true personal encounter with The Entity would not, unfortunately, be my last, it seemed.  It wouldn't even be my last within that same week.   If only I had known… but I digress.

I was halfway done with my finals, thank non existent God.  (Or gods.  I wasn't picky with my non existent beings.)  And on one morning, I was in actually a pretty okay mood, stress over finals and moving and the situation with Olga notwithstanding.  For that day was to be my first tour at the museum since the last time Krista Henderson had reared her botoxed head.  And I was excited to finally get out of that damned gift shop!  Not that there was really anything wrong with the Palace of Legion of Honour's gift shop, but I was sick of it and so quite grateful that I would be giving tours again, even if they were of paintings I had seen hundreds of times.  

My mood was quickly shattered when I got coffee that morning.  For some reason, even though I didn't even go to Starbucks that often, I had decided on a whim that morning to get coffee at the Starbucks on Geary Boulevard on the way to work.  I immediately wished I hadn't when I ordered my drink.  Because even though she had changed her hair colour again (it was orange now), the face of Julia Evans was unmistakable.  And she saw me too.  And because I had already paid for my drink, I couldn't just leave.  

"Moira!" she walked right up to me, greeting me with a smile.  "Hey!  How are you?!"

I didn't know if it made it better or worse that she was smiling and acting as if everything was okay between us, even though the last time she had said anything to me had been when she dumped me.  "Uh… hi Julia.  I'm, uh… I'm fine."

"Are you on your way to work?" she asked me, her blue green eyes sparkling.  What was she getting at?  Why else would I be over here in this part of The City?

"Uh, yeah," I looked down, shifting my weight uncomfortably from one foot to the other foot.  God, could I be any more stupid right then?  My brain was screaming out so many things - tell that bitch what's what, Moira.  Tell her how much you hate her for what she did to you, and how much bullshit it was that she brought her boyfriend to your workplace knowing you worked there!  Why?!  To show him off?!  Fuck her and her stupid ever changing hair colour! - but all I could say was "uh, yeah"?  I was pathetic!

"That's so great for you," She nodded, continuing to smile the smile that I had once found so dazzling.  It was still a pretty smile, don't get me wrong.  Only now it infuriated me.

"Uh, yeah," I repeated.  This was pathetic.  Once again, my lack of ability to handle conflict was stopping me from giving someone a well deserved piece of my mind.  

"So I was thinking," she said, nodding again, "maybe we could get together sometime for, like, sushi or something?  Like we used to, you know?  Maybe next week?"

Blushing and not looking her in the eye, I forced myself to say, "Julia, what is this about?"  I wish I could say that I said it confidently, but really it came out as kind of an unsure mumble.

She at least had the decency to look a little taken aback at that.  "I just miss you, that's all.  Is that such a crime, Moira?"

I laughed a little bitter "heh", though nothing about the situation was in any way funny.  "Oh.  Okay.  Now you miss me.  I see."

"What is that supposed to mean?" the smile finally faded off her face.

"I dunno, Julia, you tell me.  You're the one who dumped me, remember?"  

"For what it's worth, Moira, I'm sorry about that…"

"Oh, okay, you're sorry.  Just like you were sorry when you brought your new boyfriend to my work, huh?  You didn't seem sorry then.  Why say it now?"

"It's not a crime to move on, Moira!" she exclaimed.  People started looking at us, and I shrank back a little, blushing and looking down at my shoes again.

"Then move on," I told her quietly.  "I have."

"You don't sound like you have.  No offense."  Her tone of voice made it seem that she kind of hoped I was offended.

I bristled.  What was she even trying to do, inviting me out like nothing had gone wrong between us?  And because I refused, she got all nasty towards me?  I thought I had every right to be upset here.  Typical Julia.  Typical, selfish Julia.  

"I don't think it's a very good idea that we go out for sushi," I replied, trying to keep any biting sarcastic tone out of my voice, as much as it wanted to seep in there.  God, what was taking my drink so long?  Why was Starbucks always so damned crowded?  Almost as an afterthought, I couldn't help but say, "We can't even order coffee without going at each other's throats."  Ah, there it was.  Hello, sardonicness, my old friend.  Or was it sardonicity?

Despite the tenseness in the air, she laughed at my comment.  "That's what I miss about you, Moira.  You're so funny."

"I am?" I was surprised at how quickly she'd gone from bitterness to complimenting me.  "I mean, um… Don't you have a boyfriend now anyway?  Would he approve of you trying to get me to go to sushi?"

"It doesn't have to be sushi.  It can be falafel or pizza or - or coffee!"

"Don't you have a boyfriend?" I repeated, calmly.  At least, I attempted to say it calmly, I'm not sure how much I succeeded.  I had no idea what Julia was trying to do.

"Who, Ian?" She asked, frowning.  Oh, so that was the stupid boy's name.  "Moira… this isn't about Ian.  Forget about him.  I miss you."  If I wasn't mistaken, sometime during the course of the conversation she had moved closer to me.  When had that happened?  I was getting very uncomfortable. 

"Yeah, well, I… uh.."  Yes, she had definitely moved closer to me.  Now our sleeves were touching.  I gulped.  It was unmistakable - and unbelievable.  While acknowledging her stupid boyfriend, Julia was flirting with me!  So much for moving on!  She was so full of shit!  Not at all like Olga…

I frowned.  I couldn't do this - Not to Olga and not to myself.  Even if Olga and I weren't exactly together yet, not in the way I wanted us to be, I couldn't risk messing up whatever it was that we had.  Especially not for someone as self centered as Julia Evans.  Putting aside my hatred of conflict, I had to force myself to say:

"Julia, I said no.  I've moved on."

It hadn't exactly been loud or anything, but Julia still pulled back, looking as if I had slapped her.

"Moira!" the Starbucks barista called out my name - finally my drink was ready!  I gratefully retrieved it.

"Moira, wait," Julia said.  Against my own judgement, I turned.  "I… what's her name?"

"Uh, Olga," I answered, blushing.

"Really?  Huh.  Does she do that thing you like, with the-"

"I have to go," I cut her off, blushing.  I didn't want to talk to Julia any more right now.  In fact, I never wanted to see her again.  So before she could protest, I turned back towards the door and left, hailing a cab so I didn't have to wait for the bus.  The overpriced cab fare was worth it.  I would have paid anything at that point to get away from her.

My bad day was only going to get worse, though.

***

My first two tours that day went swimmingly.  It was a weekday, so I didn't have to deal with any annoyingly disrespectful preteens and teenagers who had been dragged to the museum and didn't want to be there.  It was mostly old people and a few adults in their thirties, forties, and fifties, as well as one father with a very very little girl - about five - who was clearly very passionate about showing his cute kid some art.  Thankfully, she was still so young that if her daddy thought it was cool, then to her it was cool.  I liked that.  It was good to see that even if that morning's encounter with Julia had thrown me off, there was still goodness in the world.

My third tour, however, did not go so well.  

On tours, you see, there was this rule that the tour guide always counted heads.  That tour had fourteen people in it when it started.  And it was going well, too, for all fourteen of them seemed genuinely interested in what I was saying, asking questions every now and then.

When we got to the Rodin sculpture gallery - a large, pretty room with Grecian style columns and a white marble floor, donated by Adolph and Alma Spreckels - I couldn't help but get a strange, forboding feeling.  I couldn't figure out why at first.  My heart was pounding, the blood in my head rushing.  One of the people on tour asked if I was alright, but I just nodded, talking about the sculptor Rodin like I was supposed to, trying to suppress the fear that was overtaking my senses.  I quickly figured out why.

At the end of that room there is a dome over one of the sculptures, a sculpture of three figures on a large pedestal that one could easily walk around and hide behind.  In fact, Julia and I had once made out behind there on one of my breaks, back when we had still been dating.

On that particular day, however, I could see darkness seeping out from behind the statue.  And I knew for a fact that the dome had lights in it, and the area was always very well lit, so that admirers could see the details in Rodin's sculptures.  

Which meant that despite my best efforts, The Entity was still paying attention to me.

I tried to ignore it, tried to go on, but found myself unable to answer questions all of a sudden, weakly protesting that I didn't know much about Rodin even though I knew that I knew the answers to their questions.  I gave my tour group the signal to look around the room on their own, telling them I would notify them when the tour was going to move into the next room.  Then I leaned against the cool white walls and exhaled shakily.

A man in my tour group, with salt and pepper hair and a thick moustache, came up to me to ask if I was feeling alright, if I wanted some of his water bottle.  I shook my head and thanked him, insisting that I was fine.  How did no one else notice?  Could they even see The Entity standing there?  Why was It here?  I clutched at the amulet under my shirt and closed my eyes, trying to focus on my breathing.  My thoughts turned to Olga.  I hoped she was safe.  I just had to keep reminding myself that I had a relatively short shift today, and no finals today either.  After this I could go back to the dorms and be with her.  I could see those sparkling grey blue eyes and that honest sweet smile.  Maybe I could even make her laugh again.  Would I tell her about Julia? That didn't matter right now.  

I opened my eyes.  The darkness was gone.  And with it my fear.

Smiling, I gestured for my group to follow into the next room, which they did.  I turned to count them all - and my fear returned full force.

There were only thirteen.

There had been fourteen, and I was sure that no one had wondered off.  My eyes had only been closed a few seconds.  I would have seen it.  And if not, I would have heard it - the acoustics of the Rodin gallery made it impossible not to.

I counted again just to be sure.  But there was no mistaking it.  Someone was missing.


	15. Blue Velvet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which things get even more intense with The Entity, and someone dies.

_"I have noticed even people who claim everything is predestined, and that we can do nothing to change it, look before they cross the road." ~ Stephen Hawking_

 

"So.  You won't be coming home this summer?"

"No.  Sorry I didn't tell you sooner… Kearny and Summer and Raffi and I found this great little apartment near downtown though…"

"Near downtown?  Or near the Tenderloin?"

"Well, kinda both, you know the two overlap some right?"

"Moira."

"Sorry…You're not mad at me are you?"

"Mad?  Of course I'm not mad."

"Really?  Because you sound kind of mad."

"I'm not mad.  A little disappointed that you don't even have the decency to tell your poor mother when you're drifting apart from her love and affection, but not mad."

"Right…"

"It's just you four then?  You and Summer in one room, Kearny and Rafael in the other?"

"Uh, no.  Three bedrooms.  Summer has her own."

"And you don't?  Is there a girl?"

"Uh…"

"It's not that Julia girl again, is it?"

"No!  Mom!  God, no!"

"Then who is it?"

"Uh… you don't know her.."

"First you don't tell me you're moving out for good, then you don't tell me when you shack up with someone!  What is this?!"

"Fine.  Her name is Olga."

"'Olga'?"

"What? It's a perfectly fine name.  She's from Russia."

"Russia?  Really?  I never would have guessed."

"Sarcasm's not a good look for you, Mom."

"Aren't gay people illegal in Russia or something?"

"Right… I gotta go."

***

The apartment was really coming together, if I do say so myself.  Kearny and Raffi, it turns out, both had an eye for decor, and quickly ran with making the most of free furniture left on curbsides and whatever could be found at secondhand stores, antique stores, and thrift shops.  It helped that both of them could have been art majors had they wanted to.  Kearny had chosen to run with the "retro" theme already present in the kitchen, hanging images of pin up girls, buying a bunch of fridge magnets with fifties housewives and sayings like "Oh, I'm sorry - you must be confusing me with the maid we don't have." on them, and even purchasing dishwashing gloves online with retro tattoo designs screen printed on them.  The dining room table in the apartment came down like an ironing board in the living room, which was weird, but Raffi found an old van that was going to be demolished and asked for the red leather seats, so the dining area looked like a booth at a retro style diner, like a Johnny Rocket's or something.

It turned out that Kearny must have liked theme rooms or something, because the bathroom and both hallways, as well as her bedroom with Raffi, all got the theme treatment too.  I don't know how she and Raffi managed to do it on our college student budget, but they did it.  The bathroom was themed sort of in a Victorian apothecary theme - the old phrenology head that Kearny used to give me so much crap about bringing back to the dorms finally got a home on the counter next to old apothecary bottles holding our toothbrushes and stuff, and even the shower curtain got painted with waterproof fabric paint to reflect the black and white apothecary theme.  

The hallways became makeshift galleries, united only by the fact that everything hanging in them was hung in minimalist black frames from the dollar store.  The hallway that lead to the bathroom and Summer's room was the photography gallery, a mixture of photos we had all taken.  Heartwarmingly enough, Kearny thought to print out old photos of Olga's family and include them in the photography gallery.  And, admittedly, at least two of the photos weren't from any of us roommates, but rather ripped out of old National Geographic magazines from the nearest Goodwill.  The hallway leading to the bedrooms of Kearny, Raffi, myself, and Olga, was the non photographic art gallery, mostly printed out from the internet with a few posters from my work, as well as gifts from Kearny's friends in her women's studies classes and a couple Raffi had done himself.  Our little hallway gallery included, but was not limited to: the print of "The Two Fridas" from our dorm room, a poster of "The Russian Bride's Attire" which happened to be my favorite painting at my work, a couple Norman Rockwell print, a nineteen forties propaganda style print of a Dalek from "Doctor Who" with the text reading "To Victory!", a Rosie the Riveter poster, another Rosie the Riveter poster where Rosie was black, a black and white feminist Venus logo with a fist (painted by one of Kearny's classmates), a hot pink and yellow faceless fat female nude with the word "CUNT" screen printed on it in teal, a quartet of eighties magazine art, some Asian art from Summer's parents, an icon of Olga's family, a caricature Kearny and I had gotten as a joke on Pier 39 a couple years ago (I was touched she still had it), a couple of colored sketches Raffi had done (my favorite was a fifties style toy robot attacking the Bay Bridge), two Salvador Dalí prints from my work, an ancient Egyptian style print from the Rosicrucian, and a print of the coronation portrait of Catherine the Great.  Needless to say, the wall was a bit cluttered, but we all rather liked it.

Kearny's and Raffi's room had a weird pan heritage theme going on.  Their bed had Día de los Muertos sheets and a duvet cover painted with folk art style monsters, as well as pillows in African and Batik prints.  The dresser that they managed to fit in there, found on the curb, had been painted with each drawer in a different tribal style print as well, and Raffi had replaced the missing and broken drawer pulls with vaguely ethnic looking ones from Cost Plus World Market.  Their bedside table was in the shape of one of those tiki heads at luau parties, as were three planters on their windowsill, two holding cactuses and a third holding a Venus fly trap plant, all beneath papel picado hung in the window.  The top of the dresser was covered in folk art such as Mexican sugar skulls and calaveras, and reproductions of African tribal art.  The overall effect was, I had to admit, very cool.

The living room had no real theme yet, and we decided to keep it that way.  There was a six foot tall bookshelf in there to house the television and all of our books and DVDs, from IKEA.  The futon that had been shuffling around the bedrooms before we got furniture, became the makeshift couch, since we still had no couch.  We did, however, have a multicolored chair that Raffi and Kearny had found which was so unbelievably ugly that we kind of all loved it for its very ugliness.  We also had lawn chairs out on the balcony that could be pulled in to function as extra seating if needed.

Summer joked that her room was done in a "minimalist" theme, but really I think she was not as keen on decorating as Kearny and Raffi were.  (And they had gone a little decor crazy, even if it did mean we had a cool apartment.)  As for the room I shared with Olga?  We hadn't found any cool bedspreads yet, just plain blue ones for now, though I fully meant to get cooler ones later.  The little dresser we shared, since this room didn't have a closet, had been painted by Raffi for us in shades of blue and green, and I littered the top of it with various trinkets.  The only things we had hanging on our walls?  Well, I had found an old portrait of my family playing tug of war with my cousins, and cropped it and printed it.  Hanging opposite it were profile portraits of Olga's family.  The effect was that, over our plain bed, the Romanovs and the Callahans and Schwalbachs were staring at one another.

Despite all of this happening within only a couple of weeks - weeks which, blissfully, were mostly Entity free, though occasionally I would be walking through city streets and get the distinct impression that It was there, following, and watching.  Always watching. - Kearny still deemed the apartment a work in progress, and so much time was spent in thrift shops.  On one day, after a tense phone conversation with my mother, when Summer, Raffi, and I were sitting in the living room watching "The King's Speech" on DVD (Well, Raffi was only half watching, as he also had his laptop out) when in came Kearny and Olga.  Kearny had wanted to take Olga thrifting, this I had known for a while, because she had never been thrift shopping before.  But I hadn't known she meant to do so on that day, and I was a little disappointed I had missed it.

"Did you find a couch?" Summer asked, slightly deadpan in her tone.

"Does it look like we found a couch?" Kearny asked. "No, but I found a bitching cheetah print pencil skirt dress!"

"Can I sit on that comfortably like a couch?" Summer asked.

"Shut up," Kearny rolled her eyes.  "The only couch there had this gross stain on it.  I thought it was jizz but Olga thought it was, like, cream sauce or something."

"You would think it was jizz," Raffi smirked, not looking up from his laptop screen at his girlfriend.

"Show them what you bought!" Kearny ignored her boyfriend and turned to Olga with a giddy grin.  I noticed that Olga was also grinning, and holding a bag.  And my curiosity was piqued - she hadn't ever picked something out and bought it herself before.  What would it be?

With all the happiness of a child with an ice cream cone or a bird with a french fry, Olga reached into the bag and pulled out a dark blue velvet blazer.

Now, I have a lot of old thrift shop clothes and I recognized that my fashion sense wasn't as developed as, say, Kearny's, but had I seen that blazer on the rack at the shop I would have thought it the ugliest thing ever.  But seeing Olga smile so affectionately at it, putting it on over her black maxi skirt and white blouse… I had to admit, it looked very becoming on her.  It almost looked Edwardian, worn like that.  It… well, it suited her.

***

The next day at work, I had just finished a tour and was about to take my lunch break when Dr. Brooks, in a mustard colored tweed suit, came up to me.

"Dr. Brooks?" I was confused.  Typically he only came up to me like that with news, be it good or bad.  I hoped that this time it was good news.  I hadn't exactly been in the best of moods lately, both due to The Entity and to the fact that I still hadn't worked up the courage to talk to Olga, even though now it had been nearly a month since she had kissed me.  Oh, why was I such a coward when it came to this type of thing?

"Moira," he looked bemused, "your girlfriend asked me to tell you she was here."

"G- girlfriend?" I blushed.  Was it Julia again?  God, I hoped not.  "Uh, right.  Where is she?"

"Last I checked?  She was looking at the Makovsky." 

"Uh, right.  Thanks, Dr. Brooks."  I headed off.  The Makovsky was, of course, Konstantin Makovsky's 1887 painting, "The Russian Bride's Attire".  Large and richly detailed, it was not only my favorite painting in the Palace of Legion of Honour, but one of my favorite paintings of all time.  I knew exactly which room it was, and headed on over there.

Much to my surprise and delight, it was not Julia that was in there, but Olga, in her blue velvet coat.  In any other city of California it would have been far too hot to wear that thing in June, but San Francisco always had cold summers.  (The heat didn't come until September and October, typically disappearing by early to mid November.)  I wondered if she had told Dr. Brooks that she was my girlfriend, or if he had just assumed.  I decided to assume that he had assumed.  Olga was no longer inspecting the painting, but had turned her attention to the Russian tea service and table the museum had displayed, a Fabergé original (like the eggs downstairs that I wished so badly to be able to tour, damn Krista!) donated by a Russian noblewoman and granddaughter of Queen Victoria, also called Victoria, after World War I.  

"Olga?" I asked cautiously, and she looked up with a small, slightly sad smile on her face.  "You alright?"

"Yes," she nodded quickly, perhaps too quickly.  "I was just… surprised to see this here.  When I was small I remember actually drinking from this tea set.  Now it is under glass here in America."

"That tea set?  That exact one?  Huh.  Cool."

"Or would you call it cold?" Her smile grew a bit more genuine.

"Nah, not quite cool enough to be cold.  Maybe just pleasantly brisk."  I paused.  "So what's up?  Why are you here?  How did you get here?"

"I wanted to see where you worked.  Raffi was very noble in helping me take the busses.  He took one all the way here with me."

"Is Raffi here?"

"No, he stayed on it to go to some bath house I think.  He had his sketchbook with him."

I nodded.  "Sutro Baths, probably.  It's not a bathhouse, just ruins of one.  I'll have to take you there sometime.  It's pretty neat.  So… this is where I work.  How do you like it?"

"I think it's quite wicked of you to not have shown me such a nice place sooner," she smiled at me.

"Hey, uh, I was just about to take my lunch break.  Want to come with me?" 

"Oh.  Sure.  Where are we going?"

"Well there's not really any restaurants near here, so just the museum cafe.  Come on," I led her downstairs.  In fact, I had actually packed my lunch that day, but it wouldn't feed both of us, so it would just have to stay in the break room refrigerator until the next day I worked.  I got my usual lunch there - the vegetarian burger on brioche, which was quite good even if it was overpriced.  Today I got it with Thai Iced Tea.  I bought Olga fried tilapia, which came with Irish russet potatoes and mesclun greens, and a latte, as well as a strawberry shortcake for both of us to split after eating our entrees.  Was it a splurge?  Definitely.  Was she worth it?  Oh, most definitely, girlfriend or not!

"Did you get a chance to see any of the other galleries?" I asked.

"A couple of them," she nodded.  "But I liked that one you found me in best - for obvious reasons."

"Hey, I still have to work for a couple hours.  If you like, after we eat I'll buy you a ticket to the special exhibition downstairs.  You can finish looking at the regular galleries and then look at all your family's old stuff in glass cases while you wait for me to get off."

She smiled, chewed and swallowed the bite she had just taken.  "Thank you.  I would like that very much."

I wish I could remember what else we talked about that happy lunch, but honestly it was nothing important.  No talk of The Entity, and sadly no talk of our relationship - whatever it may have been at that point - either.  We laughed and made jokes and to any outsiders probably just looked like a normal pair of friends.  Just friends.  And just as I had promised, after we finished I took her upstairs and paid for her ticket to the special gallery, instructing her to meet me outside in a couple of hours by the small glass pyramid in the museum's courtyard.

A couple hours later, she did just that.  I actually got out to the courtyard first, and was text messaging Skyler on my phone (I was trying to figure out whether It had been stalking her too, or if It only cared about me and Olga.) when I caught the flash of dark blue out of the corner of my eye.

"Hey!" I greeted her with a smile.  "You alright?"

Olga returned my smile, though for just a second I wondered if it were entirely genuine.  For just a split second, it almost seemed as if maybe it weren't.  But I must have been imagining it, for she did look and sound genuinely happy when she told me, "I was very relieved to see some of those things survived the Revolution…"

"I was worried it might make you sad or something, to be honest."

"It… was emotionally effecting, yes.  But I am alright, Moira.  I promise."

I reached out to, I don't know, maybe grab her hand or something, but chickened out and ultimately ended up patting her blue velvet clad shoulder.  The sleeve of that blazer was unbelievably soft to the touch. 

"Hey, uh…" I began, not sure how to finish that sentence.  "If… if you're not ready to take MUNI back to the apartment just yet, that's fine by me.  We can walk around the park some.  If you want."

"I would like that," she nodded.

I held out my arm for her to take, not sure if she would.  She did, and we began walking down the trail for bikers and joggers and, yes, walkers.  We walked in silence for awhile, just admiring the scenery.  We were lucky in that Lincoln Park, the park that the Palace of Legion of Honour is located within, is coastal, so we had some really nice views of the ocean and the Golden Gate Bridge.  It would have been really romantic - like, disgustingly so - if only I had the courage to take that step and ask her about the kiss!  

Oh, if only that were my only problem.

For before we could even think of a topic to break the silence that didn't really need breaking, Olga stopped walking.

"Olga?  You okay?" I turned to face her.  And once again, just like that night we had spent in the apartment before actually moving in, all colour was drained from her face.  Even her eyes looked more grey than blue just then, wide and staring straight ahead.

My heart started pounding immediately.  I was afraid to follow her gaze, afraid of what I knew I would see if I did.

"O- Olga?" I asked.  Was that really my voice, so small and weak just then?

' _why are you so aFraid tO tUrN anD look at me, moira angela callahan?  whY are yOu sUch a horrid coward?'_

I shuddered.  Was my brain playing tricks on me, or had I heard… something?  Something not quite like the sound of wind rustling through trees…  I had to force myself to turn, already knowing what I would see.  Sure enough, amongst the trees, total darkness.  It was the middle of the afternoon, and a sunny, mostly fogless summer day.  Even in the middle of the night, nothing that black could have existed in San Francisco - I mean it was a city, we didn't even get to see a lot of stars at night because of light pollution.  Yet there, amongst the trees… total darkness, blacker than black, as if light itself simply could not exist around It.

_'you'Re not sUpposed to be here, you kNow.  you are such Naughty little girls, aren't yOu noW?'_

"Olga…" I whispered, gripping onto that blue velvet sleeve.  "Olga, we should maybe… run, or something…"  But neither of us could run.  It was like our feet had been glued to the ground and our kneecaps turned into gelatin or something.

And suddenly, so suddenly that I had no time to react, the darkness was so much closer.  It was almost as if that terrible, terrible blackness was just about to engulf us.  I briefly wondered if that were possible.  I didn't want to stick around to find out.

"Moira!" a distinctly male, not at all disembodied voice, called out.  

I didn't recognise who that voice belonged to until I saw the egg shaped man in the mustard colored tweed suit jump in front of us.  By then it was too late.  The darkness engulfed Dr. Brooks and by the time it vanished - in what must have been less than a second - what had once been my boss was now a corpse, his chest opened up like a zipper jacket, suddenly completely empty of organs.  His mouth was still frozen in the last syllable of my name.

I couldn't believe it.  That could have been me.  Or Olga.  Why had Dr. Brooks taken the blow?!

"Eeeyaaah!" Olga dropped to her knees, gripping either side of her own head, and screamed wordlessly, over and over.

Somewhat shocked, I tried to yell her name, "Olga!  Olga!"  I wanted to calm her down, but she wouldn't stop screaming.  I was sure her throat was going to get raw, but considering how she had died last time, this was probably even more horrifying for her than it was for me.  Not knowing what else to do, I sat on the ground beside her and called 911.  And then, I was so in shock, I don't even remember what happened after that.  The authorities must have taken us home after pronouncing Dr. Brooks dead.  They must have questioned us, I know they must have, but I couldn't remember.  By the time the shock wore off, Olga and I were laying in our bed.  There were two bowls of untouched pho on the floor - one of our roommates must have gotten us the comforting Vietnamese soup in some effort to make us feel better or something.  It was cold and untouched.

***

I admit that I wasn't totally devastated by Dr. Brooks being so horrifically murdered.  I had never been terribly close to him.  It sounds terrible to say it like that, but, I mean, he was my boss, not my dad or something.  I felt guilty for not missing him more.  I felt even guiltier that he had died for me.  Why had he done that?  Why had he jumped in front of The Entity for someone who he barely knew?

Olga and I attended his funeral down in Colma (there are no graveyards in San Francisco.  The City's dead are buried to the south in Colma.) which was closed casket.  She wore all black, except for that blue velvet blazer, which, to be fair, was a dark enough blue that it seemed black.  I wore a knee length cap sleeved black dress with a white collar (one that had always reminded me of Wednesday Adams), a black cloche hat, black knee high socks, and black shoes.  (Kearny had said white shoes would be cuter, but it seemed inappropriate somehow.)

I wish I could report that it was a beautiful service.  But I couldn't focus on the service at all.  All I could focus on was the sudden fearful atmosphere and lump in my throat when I glanced out a window and happened to see, among the trees, a mass of black that was blacker than the darkest black.

 


	16. The Hep Cat's Guide to Back Seat Bingo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rockabilly fun, a drag queen, and lesbians! Oh my!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title is actual 50's slang

_"The Constitution only gives people the right to pursue happiness.  You have to catch it yourself." ~ Benjamin Franklin_

 

We tried to get our lives back to normal, or what passed for it, relatively quickly.  Again, I had not been terribly close to Dr. Brooks.  The new museum curator, Dr. Singh, I knew I would be even less close to.  As with the kiss, Olga and I seemed to have a silent agreement to not talk about what had happened.  In this case, it was probably for the best - the less attention we payed to The Entity, the less likely it would do to our organs whatever it had done to Dr. Brooks.  Also, I still hadn't forgotten the sound of Olga screaming her throat raw.  I was not eager to hear that sound again, ever.

I had to do something to get our minds off of it, as well as off of It.  I just had to think of what.

I got home from work one day - the museum still had to give tours, new boss or no - to see the middle of our living room floor occupied by what had once been a blue and green dresser, with newspaper spread out all beneath it, and tubes of paint from an art supply store scattered around the body on the floor, lying on its stomach by a sitting Raffi.  

I had never seen Olga in pants before - in fact she tended to avoid them - so it took me a few minutes to recognize her.  

"Olga?" I asked, a bit bemused.  "Is that… is that our dresser?  Where are all of our clothes?"

"On our bed," she looked up at me with a wide grin, and I realized it was the first time she had smiled since the death of Dr. Clifford Brooks.

"You look happy," I commented.

"Yes.  I find I am happiest when I am actually doing something.  I think I inherited this trait from Papa."

"You're wearing pants."

"And a man's shirt.  They're Raffi's," she nodded, looking back to what she was painting.  My eyes followed hers.  "I did not want to dirty any of the clothes that you and Kearny were so kind to give to me."

I looked at the work Raffi and Olga had done on our dresser.  The body of the dresser itself had been painted black, and the drawers white.  On each of the three drawers were different designs - the top had some poem written in cursive (it was, I recognized, Summer's neat handwriting), the middle had sheet music ("God Save the Tsar," Olga informed me when I asked), and on the bottom drawer Olga was writing something in Russian.

"What was this about?" I gestured to our dresser's sudden redesign.

"I got inspired," Raffi replied.  "And I thought it'd be good for her to give some input on the design.  My original idea was for all three drawers to be in English, but I liked Olga's plans better.  She's got a good head on her, this one."

Olga beamed at that compliment.

"I gotta admit, it looks pretty cool.  Even if the whole apartment smells like paint."

"That's why the door is open," Raffi gestured behind him to the glass door onto the balcony.  

I looked over the dresser again.  The stark look of the black and white reminded me of piano keys.  And that gave me an idea - Molly had told us not terribly long ago about Lindy in the Park.  Now that finals were over and I was on summer break, it was a perfect opportunity!

"Hey, Olga, do you wanna go with me to Molly's tonight?  I'm gonna call her and ask if we can."

She nodded, not looking up from the Cyrillic letters she was painting.  "After I finish this and shower and change."

"Fair enough," I nodded.

***

"Oh, hello girls!" Molly greeted us affectionately.  "I'm so glad you called ahead, Moira.  It gave me the chance to cook up a nice meal for you two."

"Whoa, Molly, you cooked?" I was impressed.

"What?  No, of course I didn't.  But I had the _chance_ to."

I laughed and shook my head.

"I read about that terrible business in the papers," Molly abruptly changed the subject, her voice taking on a cautious tone.  She shook her head, and I knew immediately that she meant what had happened to Dr. Brooks.

"I, uh, didn't want to talk about that, not tonight," I looked down at the floor, suddenly scratching at an itch on my arm.  Olga pat my shoulder, the way I always did to her.  It was kind of heartwarming that she had picked up that trait from me, and I gave her a grateful, if small, smile.

"A very wise choice," Molly nodded.  "Come, sit on the couch with me, don't mind the cat fur.  I picked up some Greek food from Myconos!"

"Greek food?" Olga looked bemused.  "I have not yet had that since coming here."

"Oh no?  Moira, what have you been eating this whole time?"

"There aren't that many Greek places near the dorms, or near our new place," I shrugged, taking some spanakopita.  Olga took some souvlaki, and I could tell from her very first bite that she greatly enjoyed it.

"So what brings you girls here to visit me, then?" the old woman asked us.

"Moira wanted to," Olga replied.  "She will not tell me why."

I grinned.  "You suggested that we try out that Lindy in the Park scene a while back.  I was thinking of going this Sunday," I turned to Olga, "that is, if you're cool with that."

"I am very cold with it," Olga smiled at me.

"So," I turned back to Molly, "I was wondering if perhaps your offer of clothes still stood…"

"Of course it still stands!" Molly grinned.  "Why wouldn't it?  I am, if nothing else, a woman of my word!  But let us eat first!"

We finished dinner, talking all the while about nothing in particular, and then Molly helped us pick out our dresses for that Sunday, which I was immensely looking forward to already.

***

By Sunday morning, everybody in our little apartment was excited, except for poor Summer, who had to work.  (She insisted she didn't care because "I can't dance for shit anyway.")  Raffi and Kearny had jumped at the chance to come along. Kearny decided to wear the leopard print pencil skirt dress she had found at the thrift store, along with fishnet tights and black heels (Being San Francisco born and raised, Kearny was quite adept in walking in heels even with the City's infamous hills all over the damn place) and her hair with victory curls in the front and soft waves in the back.  Because of her dark complexion, Kearny could also get away with super dark lipstick without looking like a wannabe goth.  She offered to do our make up as well, while doing up Raffi's hair in the closest approximation of a fifties pompadour that they could do with his short spiky black hair.  (For the curious, he was wearing a bowling shirt, jeans, and Chuck Taylors.)  I agreed that I would allow her to do so, but was surprised when Olga agreed to as well.

"I am surprised too," Olga confessed when asked, " but, I mean… Where I was from, it was frowned upon to wear cosmetics, but I see many women doing so here, and Kearny looks so pretty every day when she does it, so I confess to being curious to try it myself…"

"Oh my god, you're fucking adorable," Kearny approved of the compliment to her appearance, evidently.  "Don't even worry, Olga, I'm gonna make you look so pretty!"

Olga was already dressed, in a tea length pastel blue dress with cap sleeves, a white cardigan, and her usual white stockings and black flats.  I had teased her when she had picked out the dress that her ankles would be showing, but now that I saw it on her, I had to admit it was flattering on her, making the roses in her cheeks bloom and her eyes seem brighter and bluer than the sky itself.  (And even the fact that I was thinking in such disgustingly purple prose when it came to her showed how absolutely crazy I had gone, and just for one girl!)

I pulled out my dress from Molly and began to put it on right there in the living room - I was utterly comfortable around everyone in the apartment, including Raffi, who only had eyes for Kearny anyway.  My dress was red with white polka dots, with a flared skirt, slightly puffed sleeves, and a sailor collar.  With a red ribbon tied in my flapper bob and red flats, I thought I looked very cute.  At least as cute as someone as plain as mousy Moira Callahan could get.  I wondered if Olga agreed.  I wondered if she thought about my appearance at all, ever.

"Hey, that kind of looks like my high school prom dress," Kearny commented.

"Really?" I couldn't picture Kearny in a cute little polkadot flared skirt.  She was such a fashionista that I had assumed her prom dress would have been cooler.

"Yeah really, except my dress was shorter and sleeveless…"

"Huh," I shrugged.  "I gotta be honest, I would have guessed you would have worn something more edgy."

"In 2007 that _was_ edgy," she pointed out.

"Oh yeah…"

"What about you?" Olga asked.  She vaguely knew what a high school prom was from movies such as "Pretty in Pink" and "Mean Girls".

"Olga, don't move, or the curling iron will burn you," Kearny told her.  (Though Olga's hair was naturally wavy, Kearny was gonna style it into a more fifties style, with finger waves in the front and a big white rose in her hair.)

"I didn't go to my prom," I grinned.

"Oh?  Why not?" Kearny looked mildly interested.

"I wasn't taking a stand or anything," I clarified.  "I just had mono."

Raffi looked up from the book he had been skimming and laughed.  "That fucking sucks.  Twenty three years old and you never went to a prom."

"Today can be my prom," I replied cheekily.  In truth, I had never really cared if I had one or not, but it seemed like it would be the right thing to say.

"Today can be our prom," Olga added.  I was certain she meant it innocently, but it still made me blush, and the sight of my blush made Kearny laugh so much that she had to stop doing Olga's make up for a few seconds.

After everyone's hair and make up was done, we headed over to Golden Gate Park just in time to catch the end of the lesson.  I looked around, but I didn't see Molly anywhere.  I wasn't sure if she would show up - she had mentioned she didn't always go - but if she did she probably wouldn't have been there at the lesson, since she didn't come to dance.

I looked around at all the people dressed in forties and fifties fashion.  It wasn't exactly like stepping into a time warp - there were a lot of tattoos, piercings, and unnaturally colored hair around the group.  But it wasn't just a rockabilly event.  There were fathers with their daughters, cute old Chinese couples, and at least one gay teen couple with matching ducktail hairstyles who must have been on their first date or something, giddy as they were.

The D.J. for the day was a very short - five foot two when in platforms - girl with a red halter tap and capris that looked like they were painted on who called herself D.J. Hep Kat.  D.J. Hep Kat had tattoos up both her arms, and her hair with its thick Bettie Page bangs was half jet black and half platinum blonde.  She was surrounded by a posse of tall, beautiful, rockabilly drag queens, though she herself seemed to be cisgender.  She was an interesting looking woman, and had I not been so smitten by Olga I may have been checking her out.

The first song that D.J. Hep Kat played was "Sing Sing", and a strange boy asked Olga to dance with him.  She protested with a small giggle that she didn't know how, but agreed to just one dance when I bit down my jealousy and told her to go have fun.  One of Hep Kat's drag queens asked me to dance too, which I accepted.

"You keep looking over at your little chestnut blonde, sugar," the queen told me while we were dancing.  (Well, s/he was dancing.  I was kind of just fumbling through the steps, since I had always been a pretty mediocre dancer.) 

"Huh?  Oh, uh… sorry.  I'm a little distracted," I replied apologetically.

"I can tell. What I don't understand is that if you came here with your girlfriend, why let some phat cat with a cheap pair of Doc Martin knock offs take her first dance?"

I frowned.  "Oh.  Uh.  No.  We're not together.  She's just my friend."

"Bull shit!" my dance partner exclaimed.  "Even Kat commented on the moonstruck look you were giving her!"

I blushed.  "The fucking D.J. of all people noticed?"

The drag queen laughed.  "She liked your not girlfriend's dress.  Look, sugar - if she isn't your girlfriend, you'd better make her your girlfriend, because a girl like that won't stay unnoticed for long, and you're gonna regret it if you don't.  The song is ending.  Go.  Take her back from plastic boots!" S/he pushed me towards Olga.

"Wait!  I didn't get your name!" I protested.  "I'm Moira!"

"Nice to meet you, sugar.  I'm Heaven!" 

I wanted to shake Heaven's immaculately manicured hand, but s/he pushed me back towards Olga again.  I knew from experience that one does not simply argue with a stubborn drag queen, so I had little choice but to pat the strange boy's leather jacketed shoulder and, just as the song "Bei Mir Bistu Schein" started, ask:

"May I cut in?"

"Moira!" Olga exclaimed with a wide grin as I grabbed her from the stranger in the fake Doc Martins.  (To be fair, he was a good sport about it - he seemed to be more interested in dancing than romancing.)  

"Having fun?" I asked, though I already knew the answer.

She nodded emphatically.  "It reminds me a bit of the balls my family used to attend… except for everything is different."  We both laughed.  "In all seriousness, I quite like many of the dresses here, and the music… I can hear how this music evolved from ragtime tunes.  I like it."

"Oh, neat!  Finally some music you like!"

"I like many musics, just none that people here seem to listen to," she protested.  "I did like ragtime, even if Mama did not want us to listen to it.  Papa used to whistle ragtime tunes when he thought she was not listening, and she would sigh 'Oh Nicky…' and we would all laugh so…" Olga sighed.  "Your books say Papa was not a good tsar, but he was a good father and husband."

"And whistler?" I asked hopefully

"Hm?"

"Was he a good whistler?" I repeated.  

To my relief, the smile returned to her face at that.  "The best whistler."

The song ended, and I didn't recognize the next one that Hep Kat played… at first.  But when the vocals started I couldn't help but laugh.

"What?" Olga asked.  "What is it?  What is so funny?"

"This song!  It's a jazzy cover of my favourite song of all time!"

"This song?  This song is your favourite?" She looked bemused at my enthusiasm.

"Uh, hell yes it is!  This is a _great_ song!"  I playfully twirled her around, singing along with the lyrics, "People are strange, when you're a stranger.  Faces look ugly, when you're alone."

"Moira-"

"Women seem wicked when you're unwanted.  Streets are uneven when you're down."

"I-"

"When you're strange, faces come out of the rain," I placed a finger on her lips playfully to keep her from interrupting the most perfect lyrics ever written, "when you're strange!"

She shook her head, laughing at me.  "You seem to-"

"No one remembers your name.  When you're strange!"

"It's a nice-"

"When you're strange!"

"Moira, let me-"

"When you're straaaange!"

She playfully shoved me, a habit she had probably picked up from either Kearny or Summer.  "Let me talk!"

Shaking my head, I pulled back and gestured for her to speak.

"I was going to say it does not surprise me that this song is your favorite.  It is a very Moira song."

"You calling me strange?" I smirked.

"Perhaps.  If you will take it as a compliment," she nodded.

I laughed at that, and continued to sing along to her as we danced.  

After the song ended, I asked, "Hey, do you wanna take a short break from dancing?  There are food trucks over there, and I kinda wanna take a walk, get away from this ginormous crowd, you know?"

She agreed, and we got tamales and began to walk aimlessly, discussing music until we had gotten over to the De Young museum.  Unlike the Palace of Legion of Honour, the De Young mostly housed modern art, as well as indigenous art.  On a whim, I decided to take her up into the observation tower, which was free.  

"Wow," she said when we got up into it.  "You can really see all over the city from here."

I nodded, suddenly feeling a little nervous.  I really did want to talk to her, and if even complete and total strangers were noticing… well, no one else was in the observation tower that day.  Not mid day on a Sunday.  It was a romantic atmosphere, too.  I wouldn't get a better chance than this.

But what if she didn't feel the same?  What if the kiss had been a fluke or something?

"Moira?" Olga turned to me.  "Are you alright?  You look nervous."

Damn it.  Damn her intelligence and perceptiveness.  

"I…" I looked away, shifting my feet.  "That is… um…"

"What, what is it?"

Fuck.  It was now or never.  "You kissed me."

Immediately after I blurted it out, I wished I hadn't.  The expression on her face was unreadable.  

"Moira…" Olga began.  Then paused.  Then sighed.  

Fuck.  Sighs were bad, weren't they?  My heart sank.  I thought I might vomit all over Molly's nice vintage dress.

Olga sighed again, looked like she was trying to think of the best words to use when she inevitably rejected me.  "I… am not, as you say, a lesbian, you know," is what she started with.  I could feel my chest tightening up.  "I have liked men, always.  Never women.  There were many soldiers who caught my eyes back in my last lifetime, and I always pictured myself married to a man and having his children."

It was a miracle, really, that I wasn't just puking all over the place right now, what with the way my stomach was twisting up in knots.  "Oh… I'm sorry, Olga.  Forget I said anything.  I'll just-"

"Moira, let me finish."

"Okay…" I replied weakly.

"As I was saying… I never was interested in women.  In fact, it never occurred to me that such a thing was even possible until I came here to San Francisco.  I've always liked men, after all… but…" She hesitated, and I dared to look up.  "…but then there's you…"

I couldn't believe what I was hearing.  "…me?"

"Yeah," she blushed, but to her credit, unlike me, she was good at maintaining eye contact despite the embarrassment. "You.  Moira, has anyone told you how incredible you really are?"

"M-me?" I could only weakly repeat, absolutely dumbstruck by what I was hearing.

"Yes, you, did I not already say that?  You're intelligent and kind and compassionate, and you are very pretty, to the point where I think things of you that I had only thought possible to think of men!"

"Pretty?" I squeaked.

"I think you are.  I like your eyes.  They're kind."

"They're just brown."

"They're not just brown!  They are copper and bronze flecks against burnt honey and sage, like the earth after it rains."

"You-" I began, then stopped.  It was as if my brain had short circuited.  I didn't know how to react.

"I am not a lesbian," Olga replied.  "But I kissed you anyway.  And I'd like to do it again, if you'll let me."

"I'll let you," I whispered.

Grinning, she did exactly that.

It was softer, slower this time than the one on the train.  Sweeter, with less tongue.  But no less enjoyable for all that, even if it was only about eleven or twelve seconds before she pulled back, smiling shyly at me.  I giggled, perhaps a bit stupidly, but I couldn't help it.

"So like… are we girlfriends now?" I asked.  "Because I'd really like it if we were."

She nodded.  "I would like that too."

My face felt as if it would break into two from how wide I was smiling.  "Well, shit.  If I'd known you were gonna say yes, I would have asked you out ages ago!"

We both laughed.


	17. Sex and Candy (But Mostly Sex.  And There is No Candy.  So Actually Just Sex.)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is pretty much just a sex scene, so feel free to skip it. There are no real important plot details here.

_"It doesn't matter what you do in the bedroom as long as you don't do it in the street and frighten the horses." ~ Mrs. Patrick Campbell_

 

One of the best things, in my opinion, about deciding to make our relationship official, was the fact that it now meant I could kiss this incredible woman whenever I liked.  Which was often - no longer did I have to hold back when I saw that cute little smile of hers, the curvature of her soft lips.  Even though I was well aware that I didn't need to be in a relationship to be happy, I had to admit that when I was with Olga as my girlfriend I was happier than I had ever been.  I would have been okay being just friends as well, of course - as long as I got to be near her somehow, some part of me was fulfilled - but it was a relief to no longer have to pine away and wonder all the time!

Olga and I took advantage of when we had time to ourselves (we were still in that "honeymoon" stage that all new relationships go through) to kiss as much as possible, making out all over the apartment - in our room, in the living room, in the kitchen, in the bathroom.  Never on the balcony, due to my aversion to public displays of affection, and never in the other bedrooms because the very idea of that was just weird to me, but everywhere else in the apartment that we could kiss, we did kiss.  After all, it was a fun way to pass the time.

Not that it was all we did when left alone, of course.  We took walks.  We watched movies on the futon, her leaning on my shoulder as I pat her hair.  We talked about everything and nothing at all.  But we had already been doing all of that stuff before.  The making out was new.  (It was very new to Olga, who had only done it before with me that one time on a train.  Not that I minded teaching her, of course - she was an eager student and a quick learner, just as she had been with every other subject Kearny and I had presented to her.)

This particular make out session had been going on for quite some time now.  It had been at least twenty minutes of just us playing around with our tongues and her petting my hair and me holding her waist as we lay on our bed.  I didn't even remember how we had started kissing that time.  One minute I was making terrible puns about communist world leaders (Such as "Do you think all cats are commies because they say Mao?" and "There was a man who told me to quit Stalin and just Trotsky up to you.") and the next - probably to shut me up, now that I think about it - her tongue was in my mouth.

Anyone who has ever made out with anyone for extended periods of time knows that your hands tend to roam some, sometimes without you really even thinking about it.  So when Olga suddenly shivered, it took me a few seconds to realize I had been inadvertently caressing her thigh.

"Y'okay?" I murmured against her lips.  She nodded.  

I didn't want to make her uncomfortable, so I stopped moving that hand up and down her leg - it was utterly important to me, after all, that she was always comfortable with me.  No one likes being a shitty girlfriend.  And she had been brought up on Victorian values, so all of this was still pretty new to her.  It wasn't as if I just wanted to get laid or anything - I figured if I had gone this long without sex, I could go longer still.

Which is why I was surprised when she began pressing her body against mine, as if she couldn't get close enough.  I noticed she was panting a little - we both were, actually.

"Hey," I pulled back again.  "Sweetie, are you okay?"

"Yes," she nodded, her voice a bit shaky.  "Kiss me some more."

"O- okay."

I went back to what I had doing, and again was surprised as her hand moved down to mine, which was still resting on her thigh, and began encouraging it to, well… for lack of a better term, to feel her up some more.

"Is this okay?" I murmured more into her mouth than against it.

"Yes," she murmured into mine.

Shrugging a little, I continued what I was doing.  It was really nice, even if a lot of spit was getting on our faces and probably the pillowcase too.  One of her hands was petting my hair and the other the small of my back, and as we pressed our mouths and noses and tongues and even teeth every now and then against one another's, I continued to move my leg slowly up and down her thigh, which was cloaked in one of her many maxi skirts.  She suddenly laughed a little, and I realized my hand had hit bare skin where her shirt had ridden up a bit.

Blushing, I said sheepishly, "Sorry."

"Moira, it is okay!"

I gulped, letting my fingers ghost over the bare skin of her stomach.  She shivered again, and I reflected on the fact that the last time I had felt this part of her body, she had been technically dead.  Of course, back then I hadn't had the tension slowly building up in my muscles, and the racing of my pulse had been fear of Kearny discovering a corpse, not excitement over a pretty girl touching and kissing me.  I couldn't help but notice her chest rising and falling more rapidly now - she was pressing it against mine, after all - as her breathing accelerated.

I wasn't a complete idiot.  I knew what was going on with her body.  I wasn't a virgin after all, and I knew how to recognize human sexual response to external stimuli.  I just wondered if Olga knew enough about it to recognize I was turning her on.  

Her whimpering into my mouth didn't exactly help me to keep a level head, either.

"How does this feel?" I asked, daring to trail my left hand more up her shirt.

She nodded, a bit breathless as she replied, "It's good."

"Olga, if you want me to stop at any point, just tell me, okay?"

"I don't want you to stop.  Not yet."

I moved my mouth from hers, kissing her jawline as my hand caressed the side of her breast, under her shirt.  She wasn't wearing a bra - she never did - and the unique softness of her skin under my fingertips made my heart skip a beat.

"Is this okay?" I whispered against where her head became her neck.  I felt her nod rather than seeing it.

"Moira, I want you to do that.  I want you to go, as the books say, 'all the way' with me."

I hadn't been expecting to hear that, so I pulled my head back and rested it on her forehead so that our eyes were locked.  I didn't move my hand.

"You sure?" I asked her.  "Olga, you don't have to do this.  Don't feel obligated to rush.  If you're not ready-"

"I am ready," she cut me off.  "I know what it entails.  I checked out a book from the library called _'The Whole Lesbian Sex Book'_ , I know what it will be."  She blushed furiously when she confessed that, but I was more taken aback than she was.

"Holy shit, really?" I asked.  It must have been a lot more informal than she expected from me, because suddenly she was laughing, which caused her to move so that my thumb was on her nipple.  The laughter did break up some of the tension, though, so I was grateful for it.

"Yes, really.  I just… I was thinking about your boss."

"Wow.  That really gets me in the mood to do the do," I quipped sarcastically.

"To do... what?"

"It's a figure of speech."

"…Oh, you mean to do the sex!" She blushed again.  "But what I meant was… we could be killed at any moment.  So why not just… go for it?  There is no hell to punish us for it.  I know this now."

"Hey Olga?" I moved my face closer to hers.

"Yes Moira?" her lips ghosted against mine.

"You are really shitty at dirty talk."

She giggled a soft, slightly low little giggle that made my whole lower body throb with anticipation.

I began to unbutton her blouse.  She took in a sharp breath of air, but didn't say anything.  Looking her in the eyes, brown locked with blue, I said softly, "how is this?"

She didn't speak, just nodded.  I continued to unbutton her blouse and she slipped her arms out of the sleeves, then sat up and looked at her as she laid back on the bed.

"Wow," I smiled at her.  "You're, like, totally beautiful in this light."

She smiled up at me, nervously, and seemed very conscious about her arm placement, as if she was forcing herself not to cover up her breasts, which were, now that I could really look at them, pretty amazing.  Round, just plump enough to fill one's hand, with pert, pink nipples that stood up to greet me.

"So are you," she replied, voice slightly shaky.

"Would it make you feel better if I took off my shirt too?"

When she nodded, I quickly removed my shirt - an old eighties concert tee with the neck cut out - and bra.  Gently, I took one of her hands and placed it on my breast.  I had never been shy about sex - if I already was at the point where I was going to be having sex with someone, then we were beyond the point where I had any reason to get shy.

She muttered something in Russian that sounded like "oni chuvstvuyut miagkaya," but I didn't pay any mind to the sudden switch to Russian.  I was too focused on kissing her face, kissing her neck.  Her neck was particularly fun, due to how she squirmed beneath me as I did so, and how I could feel the whimpers and hitched little moans escaping her throat.  It was a bit of a power rush.  And if I was not mistaken, the flavour of her skin had slight coffee undertones - which was probably due to the strange manner in which I had kept her from decaying.  As I did this with my mouth, my hands began to trail over her chest.  She pressed herself into my hands.  It was a pleasant surprise how eager she was.

Her hands were feeling me up just as much, but after a while of this, she seemed to utterly forget how to function and merely held on to my head, subconsciously pressing down on it as if her body knew exactly what it wanted of me.  Fair enough, I was willing to oblige.

I kissed down her neck and chest, paying particular attention to her collarbone - which had always been one of my favorite spots on women I had loved.  Down, down I went - her nipples felt fantastic between my lips and under my tongue, like little pearls.

I couldn't stay there forever, though.  No, I was getting as turned on as fast as she was, and she was inexperienced.  In my case, I was so sexually frustrated - I hadn't been laid in way too long - that I knew it would only take a few quick strokes to get me off if she kept making her cute little noises like that and holding my head.

I kissed my way down her stomach even more, stopping at her skirt to look up at her.  She raised her head.  Her face, neck, and chest were flushed and slightly sweaty.

"Moira?"

"I just want to make sure this is still okay.  Consent is really important to me, you know?"

She nodded.  "Yes.  It is okay."

I returned the nod and pulled her skirt down, then positioned myself, one hand holding her hip and one down my own shorts to help myself - I didn't expect Olga to reciprocate on her first time.  I would teach her how another day, but today was all about making her first orgasm a good one.  That, I decided, was my goal.

It was the first time I had really looked at her vag, all swollen and wet with arousal as it was.  Framed by a ring of hair slightly darker than the hair on her head - curly and bronze - her labia were deep pink, like rose petals.  Inviting.  I could have gotten off on the visual alone.  But it wouldn't have been fair, so I began paying attention to her lower region with my tongue.

Now, I have to confess something - I may be plain looking and kind of a pathetic dork, but I know how to use my tongue extremely well.  It was something that past girlfriends, Julia Evans included, had always complimented me on.  So I knew what I was doing with her, for once in my life.

Not wanting to overwhelm or overstimulate her, I began with indirect stimulation.  I lightly kissed her clit above the hood, licked the inside of her thighs, nibbled her labia very lightly - everywhere I could think of without actually coming into contact with her hard little button.  This little game only continued so long.  Inexperienced as she was, Olga's body knew what it wanted, and it wanted this now.  She pushed my head towards her clit and I had no choice but to begin figuring out what, exactly, her body needed.

Different women like different things done to them.  Some like big looping circles around their entire cooch.  Julia had liked a constant up and down motion right on her pearly red clit.  It took only a few minutes to determine that Olga liked small, quick circles around the glans, hood, and the cute little pink pearl itself.  She also seemed to like it when I sucked it into my mouth and flicked my tongue across it, though she started to squirm if I did it for too long.  I paid as much attention to her body language as I could, though my fingers working at myself to the tune of her moans and whimpers and panting was making it increasingly difficult to focus.

She was holding my head so tightly at this point that she was pulling my hair a little.  I knew I'd probably have a little bit of a headache later from this, but at that point I didn't care.  It was kind of hot, and besides, it meant she was enjoying herself.

Now, almost overcome with desire, I couldn't help but quicken my pace as I licked at not just her clit, but the hood around it and the tops of her labia, kneading the skin at her thigh with my free hand. I was only a few minutes from coming, myself, but I just had to bring Olga off first.  I had to.

Finally, I gave one last flick of my tongue, and Olga came into my mouth, crying out her release.  Her thighs clamped around my head and her back arched, pushing her into my face a little more.  I could only hold on and lick helplessly as she rode it out.  The visual was incredibly hot, and was enough to push me over the edge too.

She pulled me up and kissed me on the lips, tasting herself on me and only pulling back to remove one of her own hairs that had been on my mouth from her lips, blushing.

"You good?" I asked her, smirking.

She nodded, chest still heaving as she came down from it.  "Yes.  You?"

"Yeah."

"Do you want me to-?"

"Oh, no, not today.  I'm good."  I paused.  "A bit hungry though."

"My throat is a little dry," Olga confessed.

"Well, yeah, you were panting a lot," I pointed out.  She blushed and hid her face in my neck and I laughed.  "It's nothing to get embarrassed about.  It's really common!"

She looked up at me, and suddenly we both erupted into giggles.  It wasn't even that anything was particularly funny.  We were just happy.

"Come on," I sat up and grabbed the shirt I had been wearing, putting it back on without a bra this time.  I didn't plan to go anywhere.  "Let's go to the kitchen.  I think there's some leftovers in the fridge, and you can get some water or coke or something."

"Okay," she looked around the room and settled for putting on a maxidress that had been on the floor.  She normally layered a sheer long sleeved blouse and a cardigan over it when she wore it, since it had no sleeves, but since we were just going to the kitchen, she didn't.  Her hair was messy, I noticed.  Some of it had come out of her bun.  It was cute.

"Milady," I held out my arm like a knight, and she took it with a small chuckle under her breath.

We were greeted with applause in the living room from Summer and Kearny on the couch.

"I- you- what are you two doing home?!  I thought you were going to see a movie!" I sputtered.

"We changed our minds," Summer said.  "We were watching 'The Help' instead, but your soundtrack was more interesting."

"Yeah, congratulations on the sex.  I was wondering when you two would finally do the do," Kearny smirked.

"Oh god," I blushed, embarrassed.  But my embarrassment was nothing compared to Olga who, without a single word, turned bright red and abruptly spun around and walked briskly back to our bedroom to hide, which caused Kearny and Summer to crack up.

"You guys," I began in what I hoped sounded like a stern enough tone, despite my humiliation.

"What?  We're happy for you," Kearny said. "For serious.  It took you two long enough!  I was worried you'd eventually snap from sexual frustration!"

"Should we get you a cake that says 'congrats for the sex'?" Summer joked, and the two started cracking up again.

I glared, flipping them off as I went to the fridge to retrieve some cold pizza and water bottles to refresh Olga and I.  Then I, too, wordlessly left the room, the raucous sound of even more of their laughter following me.

 


	18. Après Moi le Déluge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A new ability gets discovered, and shit gets real with Krista

_"Nothing defines humans better than their willingness to do irrational things in the pursuit of phenomenally unlikely payoffs.  This is the principle behind lotteries, dating, and religion." ~ Scott Adams_

 

Despite that I had pushed it aside at the time, I hadn't forgotten Olga's words.  The Entity had been dormant, but I knew it wouldn't remain so for long.  Not after it had seemingly eaten Dr. Brooks's heart.  Olga seemed resolved to live her life to the fullest, and it was inspiring.  I wanted to do so too. 

Of course, since it was summer, I had more hours at work now.  It wasn't exactly conducive to living one's life to the fullest, or any other inspirational crap.

But while on my days off I could take Olga exploring the various tiny Chinatown alleys until we found the fortune cookie factory, or take her to the strange strange stores in the Haight Ashbury district, or back to Pier 39 to act like fucking tourists just because we could, on workdays I still could walk around Lincoln Park on my lunch break.  I did this a lot.

Olga, now that she knew the MUNI system a little better, had taken to visiting me at work, either on my lunch break or right when I got off.

"Hey," she greeted me one day, sitting at the fountain that's across the parking lot from the museum.  "I brought sweets for my sweet."  Olga, it turned out, was a very affectionate girlfriend now that she felt safe to be.  

"Oh, awesome!" I took the little paper bag from her.  "What'd you bring me?"

"It is moon cakes, from Chinatown!  That one is red beans which you like, and the one with the bite out of it is lotus for me."

"I can't believe you don't like the red bean filling," I laughed, taking my moon cake.  "It's beans and it's sweet, what more can you ask for?"

"For it to not taste weird," she quipped, rather dryly.

"It's not weird!  It's good!"

"It is weird.  But so are you," she poked my nose with a smile.

Suddenly, I got an idea.  "Hey, you up to walking a mile?"

"I… okay?" she looked a little confused.

"Awesome.  I have something to show you!"

We began walking down El Camino del Mar.  I knew from experience that if you stayed on it for about twenty minutes you could end up at the ruins of Sutro Baths, which I remembered having told Olga I would take her to sometime.  She had probably forgotten.  To be honest, I had up until that point.  But even though I was in my work clothes, and she in just a casual floral blouse and tan maxi skirt, it seemed like a fun impromptu date.  Besides, I had always liked the Sutro Baths.

"This park is very nice," Olga told me as we walked, eating our dense, sweet moon cakes.  "It isn't the same park as the museum with the tower, yes?"

"Right, that's Golden Gate Park, this one is Lincoln.  Common mistake."

"It's quite pretty.  It reminds me a little of Livadia, actually."  She got very quiet all of a sudden, as she often did when thinking about her past.

"Hey, Olga?"

"Hm?  Oh, I didn't mean to make you think I am sad, Moira."

"Hey," I took her hand in mine.  "I'm glad you're here, okay?"

"Me too.  I find that I quite like San Francisco after having been here so many months."

"Yeah," I agreed.  "This City grows on you.  That's why I kept coming back to it even before I lived here."

"It's like the whole world each put a drop of itself into San Francisco soup," she commented. 

I couldn't help but laugh at her odd analogy.  "That's one way to put it."

"It sounded better in my head.  Then again, in my head I was thinking it in Russian."

"No, no, I know what you mean though.  Anything you want you can find in San Francisco."

"Yes.  I agree.  After all, you're here."

"I-" I blushed and stopped walking for a few seconds out of shock.  She giggled coyly and I had to jog a few steps to catch up.  "Hey, warn me before you're going to go and be adorable like that!"

She chuckled again, but didn't reply, choosing instead to take a demure bite of her moon cake.

"So," I finally said after a silence.

"So," she repeated.  "So tell me where you are taking me, sweet Moira."

"Remember me telling you about the ruins of the Sutro Baths?"

"Vaguely…" 

"They're really cool, I think you're gonna like them!  Back in like 1896, this rich dude called Adolph Sutro, built this _huuuuuge_ coastal bathhouse.  It didn't survive the twentieth century, but the ruins themselves are massive, and hauntingly beautiful.  You can still get a sense of how amazing the baths must have been."

"So this place is almost as old as I am?"

"Dead years don't count.  You're only twenty two still, meaning I'm older, and you should totally respect your elders."

"I respect you," she responded to my silly teasing with the utmost sincerity.  It only made me more wild about her.

"Oh, Olga," I sighed.

Our path to the sea on that foggy day in late June was beautiful, if a bit ominous.  Wind sculpted cypress trees stretched in unison around us, pointing us towards the wonderful and strange ruins.  The biting chill of San Francisco's infamous fog couldn't ruin it.  Besides, I had a blazer.  I offered it to her:

"You cold?"

"No.  I am Russian, after all."

"Oh, that doesn't mean shit.  You got cold when we went to Pier Three last week."

"Fair enough.  Still, I am not cold now.  And you will keep me warm if I get cold, yes?"

"…okay, yeah."

"Then I am okay."

We finished our moon cakes long before we got to the baths, but when we got there it was all worth it.  I watched her awed face as she took it all in.  This was another thing I loved about San Francisco - there was always something new to discover, so I was sure Olga would never be bored if she stayed here with me forever.

Hundreds of feet below us stood a moving postcard image of haunting beauty.  Concrete walls and abandoned clubhouses sat in overgrown plants and wild lilies, the sea water lapping at them.  Gone were the amphitheater and boxing dwarves and famous performers and dressing rooms and all the other trappings of the late Victorian era, though their presence could still be felt, palpably.  Still standing were the seven hundred foot long battered breakwaters.  Looking out onto the remains, it was almost as if some force above had poured concrete from the sky, creating staircases and tunnels in the nooks and crannies of the cliffs.  Some of these stairways went to nowhere and some ended abruptly at the edge of the grinding surf.

"Come on," I offered Olga my hand gleefully.  "Let's explore."

"Isn't it dangerous?"

"Yeah, but just be careful and you'll be fine.  Just stay with me."

We climbed down to join the dozens, if not tens, of people clambering around the massive, excessive three acres of ruins.

I didn't come here nearly enough.  It was so out of the way compared to the usual parts of the City that I spent time at, that I just didn't often have the time.  But every time I ended up at the Sutro baths, I realized that I really should come here more often.  In addition to the inherent coolness that abandoned ruins have (my fondness for them was what started my whole adventure that was this year in the first place, after all!) this place was… well, almost sacred, really.  It had an unexplainable atmosphere, even when one took into account the sound of the sea (and nearby sea lions).

Olga and I walked the concrete ruins like balance beams, the sea winds blowing our hair and her long skirt in a mostly picturesque way.  We made it to one particularly thick concrete wall, not too close to the ocean, (so rogue waves couldn't kill us - not that such a thing was as likely as some of the warning signs posted around the ruins would have one believe) and took a seat.  Staring out over the ruins, I kissed Olga's cheek and grabbed her hand.  She squeezed my hand.

"I have to admit," Olga confessed, "this is very…"

"Cold?" I winked.

"Yes," she nodded.  "In every possible way.  Enjoyable is what I was going to say, though."

"Isn't it though?!  I've always liked it here.  It's almost as if… you can really feel what it once was.  Like the ghosts of the original Victorian bathhouse are still here somehow, in the bones of the building."

"That was poetic of you… but you are correct.  It has…"

"A feeling?" I offered.

She smiled.  "Yes.  A feeling."

I scratched an itch at my neck, arm brushing the amulet under my shirt.  And then… the weirdest thing happened.  It was as if I had a vision, that I was in one of the old photographs of the Sutro baths, before they had come to ruin.  Except not in black in white.

"Whoa," I shook my head, bringing my attention back to the prison.

"What?" Olga asked.

Experimentally, I brandished the amulet from under my shirt.  "Hey, try something with me.  Grab the other side of this."

"Okay…" she did so, cautiously.

And there we were.  Men and women in Gibson Girl haircuts walking past us, giggling, in Edwardian swimsuits.  No one seemed to see us, sitting on the floor.  It was like watching a period movie, from the corner of the movie set.

"Are you seeing this?" I asked Olga, looking to her.

"Yes," her eyes were shimmering.  She started to stand, as if to look around.

"Hey, hey, hey," I pulled her back down by her sleeve.  "We don't know if we're actually here or if it's just a vision - if we're still on the ruins then one misstep and it's hospital time!"

"Did you know the amulet could do this?" she turned to me.

"No.  Molly never told me, and her books said nothing about it…" I dropped the amulet from my hand and was instantly transported back to the present.  I looked over at Olga, still holding the amulet, still looking around with awe.  "I wonder if she even knew.  She was so young when McCarthyism caused her family to move out of San Jose."

Olga dropped the amulet too, and looked back towards me with a wide, genuine grin.  "It's good to know.  To imagine… we're not so far from my original time as I thought."

"We never were," I answered.  "It was only like a hundred years ago.  It's not like Ancient Egypt or anything."

"We could go anywhere in the city and grab it and have a window into any time period that we want," she replied.

"That could be potentially interesting," I nodded.  "I'd like to see old Chinatown, or the financial district before the Transamerica pyramid went up, or maybe the Haight during the hippie era…"

"Do you think it works anywhere in the world?" she asked.

"Probably.  Why wouldn't it?"

"I'd like…" she hesitated.

"Olga?  What is it?"

"…someday, when we can afford it… I would like to go back to Russia.  To show you my world as you have shown me yours."

I just didn't know what to say to that.  "Oh.  Oh, Olga…"

She looked straight ahead, wind blowing some of her chestnut blonde waves out of her bun.

"Let's start saving up," I told her.

"What?" she turned to me.  "Really?"

"Yeah, really!  I'll put aside like, I dunno, twenty per cent of what's left of my paycheck after paying rent every month, and in maybe five or six years… well, I mean… It's not ideal, but it's what I can do."

She hugged me so suddenly that it was like she threw herself at me, kissing my cheeks, and I had to thrust my hand out beside me to grab the concrete and keep us from falling off the wall upon which we were so precariously perched.

"I would like that," she told me.  

***

Olga didn't always meet me after work.  Sometimes she was still in the apartment when I got back.  She also spent a lot of time in the library, enough that it was one of the places that Kearny and I let her go to on her own.  (Something which had been a completely foreign concept to her before we allowed her to do it - I hadn't realized how unintentionally overbearing her upbringing must have been.)  Kearny took her out occasionally, and Raffi had actually grown quite fond of her, in kind of a brotherly way, so he took her places a lot too.  They went up to Twin Peaks without me, even, as well as more than one museum outing. (To the Disney museum and MoMa, respectively.  And Kearny went with them to the U. S. S. Pampanito.)  Even Summer admitted she had grown on her, though Summer tended to just ignore Olga's past in favour of being friends with her as present day Olga. 

She didn't stop coming to see me, though.  I was her girlfriend, after all - a fact I was eternally grateful for.

I caught her one day looking at the Holocaust memorial right by the Palace of Legion of Honour.  It was a powerful sculpture - by which I mean it was horrifically disturbing.

"Hey," I pat her shoulder, speaking softly.  "Come here often?

She gave me a deadpan look.  "I don't think such a thing is really the thing to say.""Yeah.  It's not… I just never know what to say about this thing."

"There's nothing to say," she looked at the face of the sculpted man behind the wire in front of all the sculpted corpses.  "I was just thinking of all the horrible things Papa used to tell us about the Jews… it's hard to reconcile what I was taught with, well, everything…"

"It's hard to realize your parents weren't perfect?"

"Nobody is perfect, Moira."

"Not even you?"

She gave me that deadpan look again, then rolled her eyes, not dignifying my nervous attempt to lighten the mood with a reply.

We turned to leave and I was surprised to see a jogger standing and staring at us.  Just standing.  Watching.  It was a little unnerving.

It took me a few seconds of staring back to realize that it was Krista Henderson.  I'd never seen her out of a power suit, with her hair in a ponytail and her face lacking make up.

"Uh…" I didn't know what to say.

"Moira," she said my name like a curse.  More spat it than said it, really.  I didn't recall ever telling her my name, but I figured maybe Molly had.

"Uh, Krista.  Hi…" 

"And, I assume, that you are Grand Duchess Olga Romanov?" she turned her steely blue gaze onto Olga.  I bristled.  How dare she talk to my girlfriend like that?

"No," Olga shook her head.  "I'm no grand duchess.  I have no rank.  I wish to be seen as an American, rankless just as anyone else."

"Do you have any idea what you're dealing with?" Krista glared at me.  "My family's burden was none of your business, and you have a lot of nerve continuing to butt your head into things which you have no way of understanding!"

"Uh…" I began weakly, shrinking back a little.  I really hated conflict.  "Krista, I know we don't see eye to eye, and I mean you have every right to be bitter about your mother's affection for me…"

"Oh please!" she snapped.  "Like I care what she thinks.  Let me tell you something, I got where I was today on my own, without any help from dark forces and certainly without any help from her and her hippy dippy politics!"

"I'm sensing a bit of bitterness here…"

"Do you even know what an incredible power source you have around your neck right now?!  Do you know what a smart, capable, independent woman could do with that thing?  And you use it to, what, resurrect some poor girl to be your girlfriend?!"

"What would you do with it?" I heard Olga ask, a terrifying calmness to her voice.  I turned to see her face white with fury, her eyes almost glowing.

"I wouldn't fuck with the way things are supposed to be, that's for sure.  Eternal youth?  Time travel?  Necromancy?  Don't you know what you're screwing around with?  And what, to seduce some poor dead princess or duchess or whatever she is?!"

"She didn't seduce me!" Olga protested.  "And you are a horrible, horrible woman for accusing us!  If you want the amulet then just say so, there's no need to accuse us of such villainy!  How dare you?"

"How dare I? How dare you?!" Krista was just as angry as Olga, and I shrank back even more, balling my fists over and over.  I hated when people fought like this.  I hated it.  I hated it so much that it took me until now to realize that the fear that was starting to overtake me, to clog my throat and suffocate me, was not entirely due to their yelling at one another.

It was here.

Oh, shit.  Not here, not now!  Why did It have to rear Its ugly head, or whatever the top of the shadowy impossibly-black form was called?

_'well, well, well.  what do we have here, hm moIrA? hM? i do so Hate to sEe people fighting oveR mE.  i'd best put a stop to that, hadn't i?'_

Krista didn't see it.  Olga was so furious she didn't notice it either.  It came closer.

This time, I didn't wait for someone's heart to be eaten.

"Krista!  Watch out!" Without knowing what I was doing or why I was doing it, I pushed Olga to the ground right as The Entity lashed out, and dove at Krista to push her to the ground too.  I forgot how close to a small cliff the jogging trail was, and, hearing Olga's shrieks of my name, Krista and I tumbled over the edge.

***

Thankfully, no one died that day.  Krista's leg was broken, as was my hand.  In the hospital waiting room, Olga at my side, Krista thanked me for saving her life, but said nothing else to us.  Olga and I were understandably shaken.  There was no doubt of it now.  The Entity was targeting us.

But was It after her?  Or was It after me?

The answer would come soon, sooner than I knew then.

That night, I awoke in the middle of the night, hearing Olga crying.  I was about to turn over to comfort her - even with the anti depressant pills Summer got for her, sometimes her depression still reared its ugly head and she cried late at night.  I hated hearing it, but I knew how to deal with it, how to hold her and kiss the tears away until she calmed down enough to slip back into merciful sleep.

But I was surprised to hear her whispering, "nyet, nyet."  

I didn't speak Russian, but I knew that meant no.  

I listened, not yet letting her know I was awake.  Was she having a nightmare?

"Eto ne pravda," she whispered again after a pause.  And I realized, suddenly, that the sound in the window was more than just a simple wind.

_'oh, poor olga romanova.  don't you Know anythIng?  you're supposed to be dead.  it wouLd reaLlY just be better Off for everyone if yoU weRe.  I can make it So much bEtter, oLga, iF only you would allow me to.'_

"Eto ne pravda," she whispered again.  "Eto ne."  It occurred to me that she must have been hearing the voice in Russian, while I was hearing it in English.  

_'i Know how to stop It aLL. oh but You are afraid, aren't yOU?  don't woRry, my dear.  death would make it So much Easier, wouLdn't it? oF course it would.'_

"Nyet!" she protested, and then started to hum to herself, shakily.  I recognized it as the melody she had sung before.

I couldn't take much more of this.  I sat up in the bed.

"Olga?" I asked in the dark.  She rolled over and threw herself at me, crying and singing into my chest.  I was at a loss of what else to do besides just pat her back.  It was a horrible emotion, feeling so utterly, terribly, horribly… helpless.


	19. Tidal Wave

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We're getting close to the end

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning for mentions of suicide this chapter

_"Everyone's got to face down their demons.  Maybe today, you could put the past away." ~ Third Eye Blind_

 

With how crazy everything had been lately, it had been months since Kearny and I had gotten to hang out, just us without Raffi or Olga around.  I decided to meet her for lunch one day.  She was on lunch break from work, so we had to go to a place near her workplace.  We ended up getting Thai food at Chabaa - Olga didn't like spicy things, so we didn't get to eat it that often anymore.

It was July now, and as we ate our curries (I had yellow, she had panang) we were discussing, what else, our futures?

"I just can't believe it's going to be our last semester in August!" she exclaimed.

"Yeah, but what are you going to do with a B. A. in English?" I asked.

She shrugged.  "There's nothing wrong with continuing at H & M for a while until I can get a job better suited to me.  I'm thinking journalism might be a cool thing to look into, though.  What about you?  You gonna work for a museum forever?"

"Naaah.  Only until I can afford to go back for a Master's Degree."

"Someone's an ambitious little mouse."

"Come on, I could master in Russian history!  You gotta admit, I've got an advantage, all things considering."

"I don't think your girlfriend counts as an advantage, or else Raffi would be majoring in fashion, or being a boss bitch or something."

"Boss bitch isn't his major?" I aped shock, and Kearny laughed over her Thai iced tea.

"What are you and Olga doing tonight?" Kearny asked.  "I was thinking maybe we could all go out.  All five of us if Summer is free too."

"Actually, I was considering taking her back over to Stroganoff, by the wharf.  That Russian place.  We've eaten there before, and she really liked it.  You guys can come along too.  I just don't want to give her time to be sad today, you know?"

"Oh?" she frowned.  "What's today?"

"Well, she's been so bummed lately since all her sister's birthdays have been passing by, and tomorrow night is the anniversary of her family's massacre, so…"

"Oh shit," Kearny cut me off.  "Shit, why didn't you tell me?  We should throw her a party or something!"

"A party?"

"Yeah, something to celebrate, like, remembering all the good times instead of the horrible end, you know?  We could invite your old lady friend and everything!"

"Molly's been with her daughter a lot, actually, since Krista broke her leg and all," I brandished my hand in its cast, which had originally been kind of beige, but Raffi had painted it so now it had kind of a Russian folk art pattern all over it.

"I still don't know why you won't tell me how that happened."

"I told you how it happened!  We fell!"

"Riiiight," Kearny quirked an eyebrow, then looked at her watch.  "Shit, I gotta go.  Here, if I give you my debit card will you use it to pay for the food?"

"Mine too?"

"Yeah, yours too!  You gotta take your girl out tonight!  I got you, Mouse!"

She stood and left, and I paid for the food, taking our leftovers on the short walk back to the apartment.  Getting back, I put them into the fridge.  Raffi and Summer both worked today, so Olga and I had the apartment to ourselves.  I'd checked out "Russian Ark" from the library and was hoping we could watch it together before getting ready to go out to dinner. 

"Honey, I'm home!" I called out cheesily, expecting her to come out of the bedroom and roll her eyes at me.  When she didn't, I got a little concerned.  "Olga?" I called out again.

No answer.

Immediately, my pulse started to race.  What had I been thinking leaving her here alone?  Our apartment was on the fifth floor of a seven story building - what if The Entity had gotten to her?  She didn't have anywhere to run but down the stairs!

I ran to the bedroom, down the art lined hallway with the Chinese lanterns hanging from the ceiling, dreading finding her as a desiccated corpse on the bed.  Would the amulet work on her a second time?

I did not find a corpse on the bed.  But Olga wasn't there either.  What was there, was a note, written on yellow notepad paper.  I didn't want to read it, since I was afraid of what it might say.  Reading it, I only found that my fears were all too correct:

"Moira," the note read.  "Please, please, please forgive me.  But this is for the best.  I am supposed to be dead.  Everyone I knew and loved is dead.  Tatiana, Maria, Anastasia, Alexei… why do I deserve to live any more than they do?  I am sorry, my love.  But this is the right thing to do."

She hadn't signed her suicide note, but I knew Olga's handwriting.  My heart dropped into my stomach.  She was going to kill herself?!  How?  Where was she?!

I don't know how I knew, but suddenly I thought to look in our trash can.  There were some crumpled tissues - she had evidently been crying - and then there was another notepad, with directions on which busses to take to get to the number one suicide spot in California:

The Golden Gate Bridge.

I ran.

I was pathetically out of shape, panting by the time I got out of the building, but I continued to run.  Every second counted.  Maybe if I took Betty Lou, I could get to the bridge before she did…

"Moira?"

I spun, a little too quickly, stumbling forward as I saw Julia Evans sitting on the little Kawasaki motorbike she used to take me on rides down the coast with.  Her helmet covered her hair, so I couldn't see what colour it was now.

"I don't have time for this right now!" I turned to go to the garage to get my car.

"Time for what?  Moira, you look kind of sick, are you okay?  What happened to your hand?"

"For your fucking games, Julia!  My girlfriend is going to fucking jump from the Golden Gate, and if I don't get there soon, I might-"

"Get on," she gestured behind her on the bike.

"What the fuck?  No way!"

"Moira, get on the damn bike.  Traffic in this city is terrible and you know it.  I can get you to the bridge faster!"

I was stunned.  Julia was going to help me?  But I didn't have time to argue, so I just nodded my thanks and jumped on.

Julia sped through traffic, whizzing over hills and in between cars, and got us to the bridge relatively quickly.  I had to admit, it was a good thing she'd come along.  I jumped off before she came to a full stop, then turned to her.

"Hey, uh…" I meant to thank her, but she shook her head.

"Thank me later.  Go to your girlfriend."

Well she didn't have to tell me twice!

I ran some more.  Olga was already standing in position to jump, but she hadn't yet - I could see her, and the slight crowd that had gathered.  Damn rubberneckers.  My heart raced and I called out, breathlessly, "Olga!  Don't do it!"

"Moira?!" she turned to face me.  Tears were streaming down her face.

"Olga, don't!" I got to her.  "Please, don't do this!  I won't know what to do without you!  Please!"

"I have to, Moira.  Krista was right - we had no right to mess with history.  I shouldn't be here!"

"Yes you should!  Because I want you here, Olga!  No, I need you here - months ago I was too shy to talk to people and now I'm making friends with old ladies and fighting back when someone shits all over me and- and it's all because of you!  And you've come so far, Olga.  Please, just… don't do this.  I love you too much to lose you like this!"

"You deserve so much better than me," she protested.

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"I shouldn't even be here!  Without me you still would have found a way to be happy, and you will, I know it!  Me, I cannot be happy, not knowing Tatiana and Masha and Nastasia and-"

"Shut up!" I cut her off, and she looked a bit shocked.

"Don't tell me to shut up!" she snapped back at me, and it was my turn to be a little shocked.  "If it had been their fingernail instead of mine, you would be with one of them and not me!  So why does it even matter?"

"Why does it matter?  Why does it _matter_?  You know what, maybe it would have been them and maybe it wouldn't have but none of that matters now, Olga!  You're the one I want, and if I could bring them back I would, but- but I can't, and I- I'm sorry.  But even if I could I'd still love you!  And I still will if you jump and it will destroy me!"

"But… I'm supposed to be dead."

"No!  Fuck that!" I yelled, surprised that I could sound so angry.

"Moira-"

"If you were supposed to be fucking dead then you would be! But you're not!  If you're going to use that stupid 'everything happens for a reason' argument, well, then, I can too!"

"But, I-"

"Olga, if you jump, then- then I will too!" I stepped closer.  I was bluffing, of course.  Or was I?  I didn't even know anymore.  At that point, I realized, I would do anything to keep her here.  I hadn't been lying.  I really was in love with her now.  Utterly head over heels in love.

"But why?!"

"Because I love you!  Can't you see that?!"

"You only love me because you love my family's history!"

"Fuck that!" I repeated.  "That's not true and you know it!  How could you even say that about me?  I don't care if you were royal or a nurse in World War One or what the fuck ever, because none of that means shit to me now!  You know what does?  You're smart and kind and beautiful, and you have such interesting things to say about everything, and a passion for learning, and… and you're so utterly human.  I love you because you're not a princess, not anymore.  Please, Olga, I just… don't do this.  Don't do this to me."

She looked as if she was going to grab my hand and step back over to safety, but suddenly her eyes widened, and she yelled, "Moira, look out!"

"Wha-" I turned around just in time to see the large black mass come at us.

And then, before I knew what was happening, we were both falling from the bridge, almost certainly to our deaths.


	20. When the Wave Breaks

_"Do not take life too seriously.  You will never get out of it alive." ~ Elbert Hubbard_

 

My first thought was that it was true what people said, about one's life passing before one at the moment of death.  There I was meeting Kearny.  Back a little more, and there Skyler and I were in middle school - ugh, had I really thought those pants were cool? - snarking on the dubious quality of the cafeteria food.  There I was with Wendy and Lucas and our birth father at Disneyland.  My life was going backwards, and I knew that once it got to my birth, that was it, I'd be dead.  It broke my heart.  What would my family and friends think?  What would the media say about me?  Would my mother find out from the news?  Wouldn't that just be so fitting, for our relationship, that she would have to find out from the T. V.?  Maybe I hadn't been the best daughter to Lori Callahan Schwalbach.  But it was too late now.

"You were a cute child," Olga slipped her hand into mine, and I realized that we were both falling - and, more importantly:

"You can see these memories too?"

She nodded.  "I'm sorry, Moira.  I'm so sorry."

I didn't know what to say.  What does one say to one's girlfriend when you're both falling to your deaths?

I saw myself being taken out of the hospital as a newborn infant, and gulped.  I would hit the water at any minute now, wouldn't I?  Would it hurt too badly?

Much to my shock, I didn't hit the water.

"What the hell?" I opened my eyes, which I had clenched shut in anticipation.  These memories weren't mine.

"I think that's Krista," Olga pointed out.  And it was Krista.  She was receiving her diploma at some college.  She turned to the audience.  I didn't see Molly in it.  Hm.  When she was valedictorian at her high school - Krista had been valedictorian? - Molly wasn't there either.  I realized, maybe, Krista's bitterness at me for my friendship of her mother may have been rooted in some deeper issues.  I wished I could reach out to her, but it was too late now.  There were young Krista and Molly at the funeral of Mr. Henderson.  Then Krista's birth.  Oh, was this how Molly and Mr. Henderson had met?  At a love-in in the Haight Ashbury?  I'd wanted to see sixties San Francisco, but not like this.

"Why are we seeing all of this?" Olga asked.  "This didn't happen the last time I died."

"We should have hit the water by now," I muttered.  

We fell back through the fifties, as McCarthyism forced the Braginskys from their San Jose homes; through the forties, when Molly was just a very very small child.  After we passed Molly's birth, for sure, we would be dead.

But no, we weren't.  We watched her father growing younger through the thirties and twenties, we saw his parents escaping to America from Leninist Russia.

Oh, god.

We were going to see Olga's life, too.

I looked over to her.  She was utterly pale, shaking her head.

"Olga, if you want to close your eyes and not look, I totally under-"

She screamed, and I realized we were at her families deaths.  I didn't want to look at the floor stained with blood and who knows what else, at the soldiers packing the corpses into the vehicle.  Olga was crying and shaking as we went back even further, and morbid curiosity kept my eyes open.

The execution was the most horrible thing I had ever seen.  Nicholas was killed instantly, his brains exploding from his head and showering his daughters in a coarse spray of gore.  Alexandra, too, died instantly, and from there it was such utter chaos I couldn't keep track of who died next.  Bullets were flying everywhere, ricocheting off the girl's bejeweled corsets. Tatiana was shot in the back of the head, Olga in the front.  I couldn't even keep track of where Maria, Anastasia, and Alexei were shot, though when I looked poor little Alexei had an open wound that consumed most of his face.  He had been a child!  What kind of cause could possibly be worth such brutality?  There was blood everywhere, and screaming, such screaming.  I didn't want to look but I couldn't tear my eyes, which were now leaking tears, from the absolute carnage.

It was my turn to scream when I turned and Olga was no longer next to me.

I hadn't prevented myself from losing her.  She was gone.  Had it been because in the horror I had let go of her hand?  Guilt crushed at my chest as I continued to fall through history.  She couldn't be gone.  She just couldn't be.  And yet she was.

I had failed.

The despair was so crushing I couldn't breathe.  I welcomed the end, when I would finally hit the water.  I sobbed helplessly.  Was this the kind of pain Olga had been living with day in and day out?  Why hadn't she talked to me about it?  True, a combination of survivor's guilt and culture shock was something I had no way of even beginning to understand, but… I just wished I had been able to help her.  Regret and guilt mixed in my stomach.  I felt nauseous, and had to close my eyes and ignore the memories playing all around me as I continued to fall through history.

After a while, closing my eyes was making me feel even more sick, and I opened them, still openly bawling.  What did I care?  It wasn't as if anyone could see me.  I was beginning to doubt I would ever hit the water.  It would be more terrible - nauseatingly miserable, in fact - if I just continued falling forever.  

I saw a woman in eighteenth century dress.  She was on the fatter side, but quite handsome and dignified.  Her beauty was not conventional, but the way she carried herself - if I hadn't been so heartbroken I may have been attracted to her.  As it was, I had stopped even trying to figure out why I was being shown this.  She was speaking in Russian and I realized it was Catherine the Great.  So was I to sit back and watch the entire Romanov dynasty?

As it turned out, no.  I went back through Catherine's life - ugh, Peter III was more horrid than I had ever imagined - and followed her back to Prussia.  And I realized that what I was seeing was the path of the amulet through history.In that moment, I hated the amulet.  Why was it showing me this and not just granting me death?  At least there I could maybe be with Olga again.  As I fell through the seventeenth, then the sixteenth, centuries, my rage grew.  I was more than just sad now, I was pissed off.  

I tried to tear it off of me but it didn't work.  My good hand burned when I tried, and I shrieked in pain, both physical and emotional.  It just wasn't fair.  Why should I have to suffer through a life without my Olga just because a dumb piece of jewelry didn't want to be destroyed?

I was in an ornate palace now, hovering in the air and watching a beautiful woman talking to a man, both in purple robes and lots of jewels.  It took me longer than I care to admit to realize I was now looking at the Eastern Roman Empire - better known as the Byzantine Empire - and that was Justinian and Theodora down there.  Judging on how complete Hagia Sofia was outside of a window, Theodora had to have been in her forties or fifties - and yet she looked in her twenties, and drop dead gorgeous.  Was this the doing of the amulet?  I remembered what Krista had mentioned - eternal youth, in addition to possibilities such as time travel and necromancy.  (I wondered if I had accidentally dabbled in the latter two.)

Back even further, Emperor Constantine carried the amulet to Constantinople (not Istanbul, not yet) from Rome.  It was in a different setting - the current gold filigree was Byzantine in origin - but the polished red carnelian at the centre was instantly recognizable.  I was falling back through Roman history now.  I recognized some of the emperors - Septimus Severus and Hadrian, for example - but not all of them.  After what felt like maybe thirty to forty five minutes (how long had I been falling?  Hours?  Days?  I was certain now that the amulet meant for me to never hit the water.  But then what happened when I ran out of time to fall through?) I saw Titus at the aftermath of the Vesuvius eruption.  He hadn't been in Pompeii during the eruption itself, so I was spared that cruel sight - though after the Romanov execution and the fourth crusade sacking Constantinople, I wondered if I would have been able to handle it better or worse.  After Titus I could identify the emperors - and owners of the amulet - from memory.  Vespasian.  Vitellius.  Otho.  Galba.  Nero.  Claudius.  Caligula.  Tiberius.  

Augustus.

Augustus was instantly recognizable from the statue of him in the gardens of the Rosicrucian.  He looked intensely serious, with a mean look in his steely eyes.  He didn't look like someone one would want to cross.  He was also quite short, even by the standards of the time - though I imagined that was not something one wanted to point out to him.

I saw him taking the amulet from a brunette woman with a slightly hooked nose laid out in Egyptian ceremonial dress.  I realized that the woman was dead.  I also realized that she must have been the infamous Cleopatra.  She was, contrary to popular belief, fully clothed in death.

As my visions that I was falling through shifted to Cleopatra's life, I could see why people had been so captivated with her.  Like Catherine the Great had been, she was not conventionally beautiful, but she had a charisma about her as she spoke - even if I could understand nothing that she was saying, since I was fairly certain English had not even been invented yet.

I went further and further back, and it got quite monotonous, really.  Egyptian history normally interested me, but it felt like hours of falling, and I was not in a good mood.  I just wanted to hit the water already and die, for life without Olga… oh, great, now I was crying again.

It took me a long time before I found myself lying on something cold and hard.  I had stopped falling.  I wasn't dead.  It was dark.  Impossibly dark.  Weary, I got up and pulled my phone out of my pocket, using it to quite literally shed some light on the situation, though it didn't get any service in… whatever year it was.  There were paintings on the walls in the Egyptian style, and I realized I was in a tomb.

Was this the end?

I continued to walk around the tomb looking for… what?  A way out?  I didn't even know anymore.  What would happen if I did find a way out?  Would I be forced to live the rest of my life in Ancient Egypt?  Even with Olga at my side it would have been less than ideal - I wouldn't ever see my friends or family again, after all, and I didn't speak the language.  Without her it was a death sentence.  If I didn't find a way out, what?  I'd die in here.  And it wouldn't be quick like hitting the ocean would have been.  It would be slow.  Starvation, dehydration.  I sat down, defeated.  I had tried so hard to save her.

Having little else to do, I shoved my phone back into my pocket, lay back down on the floor, drew my knees up into my chest, and began to weep bitterly.

"I'm sorry, Olga," I whispered into the darkness.  "I'm so so sorry."

_'she can't hear you, you know.'_

I sat up.  I heard that, clear as day.  There was no wind in here, no noise pollution, which meant that what I had heard could only be one thing.  The Entity.

"What are you going to do?" I asked the darkness.  "Kill me?"  I laughed bitterly, though I was not in a laughing mood.  "Go ahead.  I don't care anymore.  You might as well."

_'oh, poor moira.  tHat would bE aLL too easy wOuldn't it?'_

The amulet burned a little hotter on my chest when It spoke.  In the darkness of the tomb I could see it glowing.  And that's when I realized:

"…you can't, can you?  Not as long as I have this," I held the amulet with my non-casted hand.  "You target those around me hoping I'll give it up, because you can't kill me directly."

_'you stupiD, sImplE-minDed gIrl.  don't you know what powEr you holD there In your hand?  you could raisE an army of the dead and conquer.'_

"I don't want to conquer!  I want my girlfriend back!"

_'theN you are a fOol.'_

I glared, in no direction in particular - it wasn't as if I could see The Entity in this dark room anyway, and the voice seemed to be all around me and inside my head all at once, so I couldn't identify where in the room It was, or if It even was in the tomb at all.  But this time, my fear of The Entity was mixed with anger.  No, not just anger.  Rage.  This thing had taken Olga from me.  And over what, a stupid jewel?  I stood up.

"I'm not afraid of you."

_'lies.'_

"Truth!  I am not afraid of you, not anymore!  You know why?  You're pathetic."

_'foolish human!  you understand nothing!'_

"No, you are!  You want to take her away from me, huh?  You want to take everyone away from me over this stupid jewel!?  Well, großmann or reaper or demon or- or Apep.  Whatever the _fuck_ you are!  Suck on this!" I tore the amulet off my neck, thrust it at the ground with as much force as I could offer - and stomped on it.  Over and over and over.

The Entity shrieked, a hellish sound, like a thousand nails over a thousand chalkboards mixed with crying infants and the tortured screams of the damned and all sorts of horrid things.  I could feel warm fluid coming out of my ears and nose - blood, probably - and my head began to throb in agony, but I kept stomping until the shrieking stopped.

And I knew, then, that I was alone.

I lay back down on the floor of the tomb and waited to die.


	21. Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The last full chapter. This is the end, kiddos. Thank you so much for all your support, I'm still in awe that anyone read this at all! uwu

_"It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are." ~ e. e. cummings_

 

I don't know how long I lay there.  It could have been hours, it could have been days.  Longer?  I didn't know.  I had so many regrets.  I should have left a note for Kearny.  I should have tried to understand Krista Henderson better before writing her off as just a bitch.  I should have been nicer to my mother.  I should have, I don't know, stopped Dr. Brooks from dying for me.

I tried to stretch my legs out - they were getting kind of cramped - and was blocked by something.  Putting my hands up, I realized I was in a box or something.  Well wasn't that just fucking wonderful?  Buried alive.  I supposed that it was as fitting an end as any for me.

I heard voices now.

Oh, god, this was it, wasn't it?  I had read once that people who spent a long time in solitude went crazy and started having audio and visual hallucinations.  Was that what was happening to me?  I gulped.

But then, upon actually listening to the voices, I recognized the tone.

That was unmistakably the tone of a museum tour guide.  Being one myself, I recognized it.  Had I been waiting in this tomb for thousands of years now?  It felt like I had been laying down a long time - my legs were cramped and I was kind of thirsty - but certainly not _that_ long.  I held my breath, waited for the tour guide - who was speaking English - to finish.  After a few minutes of silence, I felt my way around the box or coffin or sarcophagus or whatever it was I had been laying in, and found a hole in the lid above my feet.  Stepping out and stretching, legs a bit shaky, I realized where I was.

"But that's impossible," I whispered.

I reached into the sarcophagus and grabbed the amulet - the centre stone was chipped, dull, and cracked now, but I still didn't want to just leave it there.  Then I exited the fake tomb replica and walked up the stairs into gallery B of the Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum.  I was done trying to make sense of today.  Or of my life.  I'd brought a girl back from the dead with coffee, for fuck's sake.  This was just another item on the long list of weird shit to happen to me. 

I walked out of the museum without a word, pulled my phone out of my pocket, and called Skyler.

It rang once.  Twice.  Then she picked up:

"Moira?"

"I'm at the Rosicrucian.  Can you come give me a lift back to the CalTrain station?"

"Oh my god, you sound terrible!  Are you okay?"

"I don't wanna talk about it."

"O- Okay.  Okay, I'll be there soon, just wait out front."

"Kay," I hung up and waited.

She picked me up in her Prius and as soon as she saw me, told me:

"Moira, you look terrible."

I shrugged.  At this point I wasn't even depressed anymore, just horrifically… numb.  I felt like a robot, emotionless.  And I just didn't care anymore.

"I'm not taking you to the CalTrain station," Skyler told me.

"Hm?" I looked up at her with disinterest.

"I'll drive you home.  What's the address?" she pulled out her GPS.

"Skyler, you really don't have to-"

"Yes.  I do," she told me in a tone that suggested I had better not argue.  "What's your address?"

I gave it to her, and we drove off.  She put on a satellite radio station of old music that I liked, so I wouldn't have to talk.  I appreciated her for that.  I appreciated Skyler so, so much.

Skyler paid for meter parking up in San Francisco, even though parking by the apartment was sketchy at best, and walked me up the stairs to my apartment.  I didn't have my key - I hadn't grabbed it when I'd gone after Olga.  I knocked on the door.

Kearny opened it.  Her skin looked ashy, like she'd seen a ghost.

"Moira… oh my god, you're alive," Kearny whispered.  Then she drew me into an embrace.  And finally, I began to weep.

***

I spent the next few days in my room.  I didn't eat.  I barely slept.  I called in sick to work.  Thank the non existent gods  that it was summer, because I would have cut class if I'd had any.

My mood swung from depressed to suicidal to numb, like the world's worst pendulum.  What made it all even worse was how much everything reminded me of Olga.  My bed still smelled like her.  Her photo hung on my wall.  The matryoshka dolls on my dresser were hers, the Russian handwriting on the bottom drawer was hers.  Some of her dirty laundry was still in our dirty laundry pile in the corner of the room.

At first, Kearny and Summer worried about leaving me alone.  But I had barely enough energy to walk down the hall to take a piss.  I wasn't going to try and kill myself, much as I may have wanted to at times.  As I understood it, Skyler was calling Kearny every night to check up on me.  Just in case.

What would I do without Olga?

True, I had functioned without her for the first twenty three years of my life.  But now that I had known her… now that everything reminded me of her… well, whoever it was who had said that it was better to have loved and lost than to never loved at all?  I wanted to stab them in their stupid face because they could not have been more wrong.

It wasn't fair.

Summer tried to get me to eat, but I couldn't.  The very thought of it made me nauseous.  She gave me sleeping pills from her work so I would at least sleep better, but as they had to be taken with food, I refused them.  Raffi and Kearny tried buying me my favorite foods, getting me to go out in the living room to watch movies with me, everything.  But everything had lost its appeal without Olga at my side.  I could still hear her giggle.  It haunted me whenever I did manage to get some sleep. 

But at least when I slept, we were still together in my dreams.

***

I didn't know how many days I moped, but it was at least five days, and possibly over one week.  One day, though, I was in the apartment alone - as much as Kearny hated to leave me alone, she and Raffi and Summer all had their day jobs to deal with - and there was a knock at the door.

I bundled the blanket on my bed around me.  I didn't want to get the door.  Maybe if I just pretended that I wasn't here they would go away.

No such luck.  Whoever it was, they were insistent.  They kept knocking, no matter how long I tried to just ignore it.  Eventually, their stubbornness won out over my own, and I wrapped the blanket around me and got up to answer.  I looked horrible - my unwashed hair was a mess, and I knew I probably had dark circles under my eyes, which were puffy and red from crying. My lips and nose were chapped.

None of that mattered when I opened the door and saw who it was standing on the other side.

"Hello, Moira," Olga said, her lip quivering up into a small little smile, while at the same time her eyes shone with tears that threatened to spill over.

"You- what- how-" I sputtered.  

And then we were embracing and both crying and babbling all at once.

"Well," a third voice said, "forgive me for interrupting your happily ever after moment, but these crutches are killing me."

I pulled back to see Krista, looking annoyed.  I looked back to Olga, about to ask what she was doing here, but decided to be polite.  After all, I had wanted another chance to be nicer to Krista instead of just writing her off as a total bitch.  This was my chance.

"Come in, both of you," I gestured behind me to the futon that still functioned as our couch.  "Sit down."  They did so.  "I, uh…"

"I hit the water," Olga explained, somehow knowing what my first question had been.  So that was why she had disappeared as I fell through time.  

"How are you alive?!" I demanded.

"She was brought back to life to live out the life she was meant to have," Krista answered.  "She can't die by violent means.  Didn't you read the book my mother gave you about that amulet?"

"I tried to, but I couldn't understand all of it…" I shrunk back weakly.

"Krista and her boyfriend happened to sail by and find me," Olga continued.  

"I didn't know you had a boyfriend," I said to Krista.  She shrugged.

"There's a lot you didn't know about me."

"I'm sorry…" I offered.

Krista shrugged again.  Olga cleared her throat and gave her a very pointed look, and much to my surprise, Krista's shoulders wilted a bit, as if Olga had been training her to… what, be nicer?

"It's alright," Krista said slowly.  I guess that was exactly what Olga had been training her on, because my girlfriend nodded approvingly.

"She took me back to her apartment and got me back on my feet, got me more anti depressants, even took me to Stroganoff," Olga said.  "After we spoke some, you know, Krista is not so bad Moira.  We should have given her a chance."

"I know," I nodded.  "I totally agree.  Krista… thank you.  So much."

Krista shrugged for a third time, a bit taken aback.  She didn't seem to know how to accept phrase.  "I… it was nothing.  You saved my life, I saved hers.  So we're even, alright?"

"No," I answered.  "It's not alright.  I'd… like to get to know you better.  And maybe, I dunno, help you repair your relationship with your mom?  Maybe we could all have dinner sometime."

Krista looked stunned.  "I… okay.  I'd like that." She grabbed her crutches, blushing, and got back to her feet.  "My cab will be waiting. I'll see you later, Olga."

"Bye," Olga waved courteously as Krista left.  As the door shut behind her, Olga turned her grin on me.

"Olga…" I didn't know what to say.

"Moira, I'm so sorry I didn't tell you when my pills ran out.  I should have.  Can you ever forgive me?"

"I already have," I embraced her again.  "I'm just relieved you're okay.  I love you so much, I- I don't know what I would have done without you…"

"Oh, Moira, I love you too…" We kissed.  It was a disgustingly sappy and cheesy moment and I loved every stupid second of it.

We pulled back and exchanged cheerful smiles, and Olga was the first to change the subject:

"Moira, I don't like being a… Krista called it a 'freeloader' I think?  I felt so useless before.  I am happiest doing something, and I would like to not be Grand Duchess Olga anymore, but just a normal girl, like you and Kearny and Summer… can I get a job?"

I wasn't expecting that, so I nodded.  "I… yeah, I guess.  But where?"

"Rika offered to help get me hired as a waitress at Stroganoff.  It's not much, but…"

"No, I think that would be great for you!" I beamed at her.  I was so proud of her.  "I think it'll be good for you to have a life outside of me, to have, like, Russian friends and stuff.  Otherwise you'd get sick of me."

"I could never get sick of you, Moira."

We embraced again and laughed.  And I was happier than I had ever been.


	22. Epilogue - Alexandra "Sasha" Callahan

_"Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get.  But if you work really hard and you're kind, amazing things will happen." ~ Conan O'Brien_

 

And life went on.  Kearny and I graduated from college.  Olga liked waitressing at Stroganoff, and contributing to rent.  Five years later, Kearny and Raffi were engaged.  Kearny was now working at a local feminist magazine targeted at women of colour, and Raffi at City Hall.  (He had forged Olga a citizenship through marriage certificate, so we were legally married though we had not had any wedding - and assured us that what he had done was "so so illegal" and that if we told anyone "you're gonna wish you had died on that bridge!")  

Summer was almost done with medical school, and I was going through a master's program and trying to get a teaching position at both Berkely and Stanford, following in Molly's footsteps.  I still worked at the Palace of Legion of Honour, in order to pay bills, but meant to quit as soon as it was financially possible.  As much as I loved the museum, I couldn't work there forever.

Molly and Krista had worked at trying to repair their damaged relationship, and Krista seemed a lot happier for it.  It helped that her boyfriend proposed to her and she soon got married (in Sausalito - it was the fanciest event I'd ever been to), and she was soon pregnant.  Krista had the kind of high energy that was well suited to being a mother.  She named her daughter Molly, after her mother.

Skyler moved to Colma, and visited us a lot.  She got a job as a mortician - and to be perfectly honest, if she was going to go for such a job, than Colma, "the city of the dead", was a good place for her.

I still wore the amulet under my clothes, though at this point it was more out of habit than anything else, since it was cracked and no longer seemed to have any mystical powers.  I had offered to give it to Krista's daughter, but she had turned it down - she wanted Molly Jr. to have a normal upbringing, free of "any of that mystical shit."

We hadn't yet made it out to Russia, but Olga and I still had time to go on dates.  And one of our favorite places actually ended up being the Rosicrucian Museum down in San Jose, which we always found time to visit whenever we went down to San Jose to visit my mom.  (I figured if Krista could repair her relationship with her mother, then so could I!)  I had told Olga the story of how I had inexplicably ended up at the Rosicrucian after getting rid of The Entity for what I hoped was for good.  She didn't understand it anymore than I did.

It was on one of these museum dates that Olga asked me, somewhat near the mummies and the tomb replica, "Moira, can I ask you a question?"

"Always."

"All those years ago, when you brought me back to life… how did you do it?"

I had to think about it for a few seconds.  "Uh… Kearny chanted some mumbo jumbo over the amulet, we were just fooling around, and… I dunno, for some reason some word came to my head.  It was so foreign, like I hadn't thought it but it had been implanted in my head or something… So I just… said it.  And then later there you were.  I'm sorry, that sounds stupid, doesn't it?  It's true though."

"It does not sound stupid.  Not anymore than anything else in your life, anyway."

I laughed.  "I guess when you put it like that…"

"What was the word?" she asked me.

"…Exmortis."

Suddenly, I got a burning sensation in my chest.  I coughed, grasping the amulet.  Olga gasped, and we heard banging.

We turned, horrified to find the little girl mummy was now a live toddler, banging to be let out of the glass.  What else could we do but pick the lock with a bobby pin and open it to let her out?

"I thought the amulet didn't work anymore!" Olga exclaimed, wrapping the frightened child in her shawl.

"So did I!" I blinked.  "Well… you up to raising a daughter?"


End file.
